


Anyone But You

by StarlightRaine



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Anal Sex, Angst, Best Friends, Childhood Friends, Eventual Relationships, Eventual Smut, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff, Freeform, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, M/M, Masturbation, Mentions of alcohol, Oral Sex, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Smut, These tags are spoiling the story, University, Unrequited Love, Vague Descriptions of Straight Sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-19
Updated: 2017-05-29
Packaged: 2018-05-21 14:41:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 58,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6055321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarlightRaine/pseuds/StarlightRaine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Although Dan and Phil don’t exactly start off on the right foot, they become fast friends and the most important parts of each other’s lives.  However, over the years of knowing each other, Dan’s feelings for Phil morphs into something else.  But what will Dan do when he finds out that Phil also has these exact same strange fluttery feelings – feelings that Phil doesn’t feel for Dan but for someone else?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Holy shit, so this is my first phanfiction (hell, this is my first fanfiction that I've ever written), and it may be really terrible. Nevertheless, I am sort of proud of it so far (well, confident about it enough to actually post it on the Internet). 
> 
> This phanfiction is loosely based off of the anime Junjou Romantica: Egoist. However, this story is nothing of the anime's main plot. For those familiar with the anime, it's loosely based off of one minor story of Hiroki's and Usagi's childhood backstory (Season 1 Episode 9). But it isn't based off of the main storylines in the anime.
> 
>   ~~Also, this story takes place in England, but I'm American, so I apologize in advance for all of the American spellings and idioms that slipped in that I've overlooked while proofreading!~~
> 
>  **Edit** : Thank you to my beta [**Alex**](http://maybeelsewhere.tumblr.com/) for going over the fic, fixing my mistakes, and helping me with my awful Americanism (I know that's not a word, shhh)! You're amazing<3
> 
>  
> 
> ~~Schedule: every **Thursday** unless I say otherwise. (Also posted on [**Wattpad**](https://www.wattpad.com/story/63448250-anyone-but-you))  
>  **Update** : So for the first 10 chapters I've been good about updating and informing the audience beforehand if I couldn't update. Now, the update schedule is going to be sporadic. As I'm starting university, I don't have time to write as much as I want to. I hope you all understand and I apologize if I go on long hiatus. (I will try updating as much as possible, but in truth is that it takes a lot of time - over a week - as well as a lot of concentration and effort and passion to write each chapter, and I used to have them pre-written before posting on Thursdays) ~~
> 
> **UPDATE** : Discontinued.   
> 
> **I hope you all enjoy!** tumblr: [**StarlightRaine**](http://starlightraine.tumblr.com/) Alex (beta): [**maybeelsewhere**](http://maybeelsewhere.tumblr.com/)

I exploded.

I ran out of my house, ignoring my mother's calls of my name. My legs sprinted as fast as they could, as if trying to get the overwhelming frustration building up inside of me to sprint out of my body.

Monday was tutoring. Tuesday was piano lessons. Wednesday was tutoring and swimming. Thursday was extra mathematics class. Friday was singing lessons. Saturday was tutoring and swimming. And on top of everything, I have to manage school and its massive load of schoolwork. When will I ever have time to relax? Surely, other fourteen year olds didn't have to juggle so much work at this age?

My mother always scoffed at my complaints whenever I broke down in frustration. "Dan, if you're going to keep complaining, then there is no point in all these lessons," she told me. "Quit one of them, and surely –"

"No!" I always responded. My parents told me to quit any of my lessons if they got too hard to manage. But I didn't want to quit. It would be admitting defeat. I wanted to prove to myself that I could excel in these lessons, and giving up would be as if I failed myself.

I continued sprinting. At times like this, when everything got too hard for me to handle, when I beat myself down with so much stress and weariness, I went to the forest to my secret hideout to block the world out.

My secret hideout was one that no one knew about. It was deep in the untraveled woods, where a certain location had a rich layer of grass coating the ground. Although the hideout was in a forest, the spot itself was bare of trees. It was an area where I could lay down on the grass and view the sky. Here, the sky was clearly visible in the thick forestry, where the stars radiated the brightest in the night, and the sky looked the bluest in the day.

For years, I have gone to this area for time alone. Here laid my safe haven, my personal escape from the real world. I have never taken anyone here, as I never planned to share my hideout. No one had ever been here but me.

Until today.

As I reached my hideout, I slowed down to a stop as confusion ran through me. There was a black-haired boy around my age sleeping peacefully at the centre of the spot with a notebook in his grasp. I stared at him, as if gazing at him would magically provide me with answers upon who he was and what he was doing here.

Suddenly, he started stirring, causing me to freeze as I apprehensively awaited his next movements. He rubbed his eyes and slowly sat up. I didn't wait for him to finish rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. He was in _my_ hideout, and if he wanted to sleep, he should have done it somewhere else!

"What the hell are you doing here?" I fumed. "This is _my_ hideout! You can't just come here without my permission!"

He stopped rubbing his eyes and blinked up at me, dazed and confused. "Permission?" he asked softly. "How do I do that?"

"Uh well, um -," I stuttered. I wasn't prepared for him to respond so calmly, or for him to actually ask me how to ask for my approval. "Well, it's permission. So first, maybe you can start by asking me nicely."

"Please," he responded immediately.

"What?" I questioned, taken aback by how quick and instantaneous his response was.

"Please," he repeated softly. He continued looking at me with large blue eyes which begged for my approval to let him stay.

I hesitated. I studied him while choosing to sit on the patch of grass across from him. He didn't seem like any trouble, really. In fact, he seemed quite polite and nice. He had a grey jumper with foxes on it, and his legs were occupied by black, loose-fitted jeans that seemed a little too big on him. Even though he had loose jeans and a silly animal jumper, his face was what made me feel guilty for snapping at him. He looked so harmless. The darkness of his black hair contrasted greatly with his overall white skin. Despite his paleness, his face wasn't void of colour. His cheeks held a light-pink hue, while his lips were a rosier, pinker shade. And his eyes, _wow_. They were such a stunning blue, a blue that would seem so fake and unnatural on anyone else, but suited his face so well. Large, blue eyes like the sky on a bright, clear day.

All of a sudden, I felt plain and ordinary compared to him. My features were brown. My hair and my eyes were the same shade of chocolate brown, and my skin was light brown – or, in other words, slightly tan. I didn't have as much colour and vibrancy in my features compared to this boy. However, I quickly shoved those thoughts away. What a stupid thing I had suddenly felt unconfident about. I have a face, who cares whether or not I had colour on it?

"Alright," I approved begrudgingly. This was my secret hideout, but now there was a new member. I heaved out a small sigh. "I'm Dan," I offered reluctantly.

"I'm Phil," he replied while moving to rest his back against a tree. He didn't acknowledge me further. Instead, he pulled out a pencil from his pants pocket and opened up his notebook.

I sighed again, pulling my knees up to my chest and resting a cheek on my knee. I originally came here to have some time to myself and think about something other than schoolwork and lessons. I would lay on the grass and stare up at the sky, getting lost in the mix of blues, greens, yellows, and whites that swirled above me. My mind would relax and temporary take me away from the real world to an imaginary setting. Sometimes I would childishly dream of being a superhero and plan out secret missions and operations. Sometimes I would think about going to Japan and visiting the world's biggest comic book store and the world's biggest Pokémon shop. Sometimes I would dream about how cool it would be to live in fantastical worlds that I've read in books or seen in movies. Like Hogwarts. Hogwarts would be _So. Much. Fun._

This hideout meant so much to me. It was a constant that always stayed with me when my world went into disarray. It always allowed me to relax in solitude. Today, however, my hideout was being stubborn by removing its usual privacy.

After about ten minutes of staring off into the forest while churning grumpy thoughts of having another presence here, I turned to look back at the black-haired new boy.

 _What a weirdo,_ I thought as I studied him for a minute while he continuously scribbled onto his notebook. _His expression never changes. What the hell is he writing about anyways?_

Suddenly, he looked up and locked his eyes with mine. I would have been embarrassed of being caught staring if I hadn't been so irritated. It was as if every time I watched him, he could feel my gaze and looked up to catch me in the act.

I pushed my irritation aside. "How did you find this place anyways?" I asked him curiously. "I thought no one knew about here."

"Well," he started, his calm expression unchanging. "There was a kitten on the road. I reached to pet it but it ran away, and I tried to chase it and it led me here." Phil glanced up at the sky. "The sky looks nice. It's like it's kinda floating between all the trees."

I widened my eyes when he finished talking. I was a little surprised. I didn't think anyone else would find this place, let alone discover the trait of the hideout which I liked the most: the sky that looked beautiful here.

As much as I didn't like the idea of sharing this hideout, a spot that I've grown used to being solely mine for years, I decided to suck it up and stop acting like I was three and accept the change in the pattern. It wasn't like this spot was my property, even though I still deemed it to be mine for years. We continued sitting there together in silence, with him writing in his notebook while I dwelled with fictional thoughts and imaginations.

The sky's light blue hue morphed into a darker shade, which was my cue to get up and return home. "It was nice meeting you," I tentatively told him. It came out more like a question than a formality. "I'll see you around, maybe?"

He glanced up, presenting a small smile on his yet unchanged calm expression. He gave me a small nod. "Bye," he replied shyly.

I muttered a goodbye and headed home. I started thinking about him as an individual for the first time, rather than as a new interruption. I should have talked to him, gotten to know him. The only thing I knew about him was his name in the hour I had spent with him, and that he chased a poor kitten into the forest.

I let out a breath as I entered my home. Maybe I could be friendlier to him the next time I saw him. Man, I really have to work on my people skills.

\- x -

It turned out, Phil moved to my school the next day.

"We have a new student joining us!" our mathematics teacher exclaimed while standing next to Phil at the front of the room. "His name is Philip Lester, and he moved here from America! Be sure to welcome him..."

As our mathematics teacher introduced Phil, visible reactions were shown by everyone in the class. All of the girls had suddenly developed an interest for the new boy, squealing phrases such as "Philip is so cute!" and "Wow, he's from America? How cool!" Meanwhile, the girls' centred interest for Phil pissed off the boys, as they muttered "What's so great about America anyways?" and "He doesn't look that special, I don't get what all the fuss is about."

However, the centre of attention himself looked completely uninterested, as if entirely unaware of the situation around him.

I put an arm on my desk, resting my chin in my hand, and I studied Phil. He just stood there expressionless. _He really is a weirdo,_ I thought to myself. _There isn't any expression on his face._

The teacher offered him an empty seat at the front of the room near the door. As he walked to his desk, he glanced up and located me at the back of the room, and gave me a shy smile. I smiled back at him, and started to feel sympathetic for him and perhaps a little guilty. He was in a new area, in a new school, where everything was unfamiliar to him. I was the only person here he slightly knew, albeit he only knew my name. And yesterday, instead of making him feel welcomed and comfortable, I had selfishly worried more about him finding my secret location.

Mathematics was over soon, and I planned to go over to Phil and be more welcoming towards him, feeling guilty for not doing so yesterday. However, as soon as I finished packing my belongings, I turned to where Phil's seat was, only to see that his surrounding was completely enveloped by five girls who obviously yearned for his attention and affection.

"How long were you in America?" one of the girls giggled.

"About five yea-" Phil started, but got cut off by another girl.

"You're so adorable, you must have a pretty girlfriend back home in America?"

"No, actually I-"

"I'm available, if you're considering someone," another girl winked.

"That's okay, I'm not really-"

"What's your next class? Maybe we have Geography together. And there's an empty seat next to mine!"

"I actually have English-"

I stifled a laugh as I watched a confused and swamped Phil getting bombarded with questions and being unable to fully give an answer. It was quite amusing to see a startled and overwhelmed demeanour on his usually constant, calm expression. He glanced up and found me biting my lip to hold back my laughter, and he seemed to beg for help with his eyes.

I chuckled and walked up to his desk, ignoring the students around him. "Hey Phil," I casually greeted him. "What's your next class? I'll walk you there."

He smiled at me, not even trying to hide the relief that was flooding his face. "That sounds great, thank you. I have English next with Mrs. Mortimer."

"Alright, come on then," I lightly put my hand on his elbow and gently steered him away from his crowd, ignoring how some of the girls gaped at me for getting the chance to walk with him, as if he were some celebrity. How dare my peasant hands touch him.

When we were out of earshot, I dropped my hand and Phil turned to me. "Are girls always like that here?" he asked timidly.

"Nah," I replied, trying to sound casual to make him more comfortable. "You're just kind of like a mini-celebrity right now, since you're not exactly hideous and you moved here from America. Not much happens around here."

There was a pause before either of us started talking again. "'Not exactly hideous,'" he eventually snorted, repeating my words.

I raised an eyebrow at his new tone, not expecting sarcasm from this polite boy. "Shut it," I teased. I was slightly proud when I got this shy kid with literally one facial expression to crack a small grin while sporting a playful glint in his blue eyes.

However, this small accomplishment quickly vanished when he wiped away the meagre traces of happiness and instead put the familiar cloak of his almost monotonous appearance as we approached Phil's English class. Any signs of contentment were gone. Christ, that expression was literally so annoying, I wanted to completely destroy that look off his face.

We slowed to a stop in front of his class, and I turned to face him to wish him good luck with English, when he interrupted me.

"Thank you, Dan," he whispered inaudibly, as if not wanting me to hear him. Maybe he didn't, as his voice did hold an embarrassingly high amount of uncertainty as well as sincerity. I was confused. I didn't see why a person needed to feel uncomfortable for thanking someone for helping them with the small task of walking them to class.

"No problem," I replied. He waved me a goodbye and went inside the English classroom. He didn't look nervous, just kind of distant. I chose to ignore it and my legs took me to my own classroom, my French class.

\- x -

The rest of the day lagged on slowly. I didn't see Phil at lunchtime or for the rest of the day. I bit my lip, trying to push away the feeling of – guilt? Frustration? – gnawing at my stomach. Why was I feeling so bad? He was not _my_ responsibility! Was I still feeling guilty because of the secret hideout thing? I huffed out a breath, trying to exhale my frustration out as well, and slouched down into my seat.

"Well, _someone's_ in a good mood," a familiar voice teased. I turned my head to the guy sitting next to me and was met with curly brown locks and vibrant, warm green eyes. He gave me a crooked grin, his white teeth flashing which have never failed to catch me off guard.

I've been best friends with PJ since we were five, and we've seen each other grow and change throughout the years. However, when puberty hit him last year, it was the biggest change I'd ever seen PJ go through in a short amount of time. Puberty blessed him with such unfair attractiveness which now always had strangers giving the almost-fifteen-year-old second looks, and had everyone stunned and dazed by his appearance. Including boys. Including adults. Hell, including _me._

"Hello to you too," I muttered as I pulled out my pens and exercise book for my last period.

PJ rolled his eyes, but still grinned at me. "I already saw you at lunch," he poked my sides, causing me to give an obviously manly squeal. "Jeez, didn't think you would miss me so much already."

I forgot about my guilt at this moment. I let out a chuckle as I hit my notebook against the back of his head, which made him laugh loudly. "I know, it's been _so long_ since I last saw you! It feels like it's been two months." I pretended to pull a disappointed face and pouted my lips. "Though I expected rainbows and flowers and a soppier reunion. Is that too much to ask?"

"Oh my god," PJ groaned, pretending to be extremely aggravated as he hid his face in his hands. "You're literally so annoying, why do I hang out with you?"

"I really don't know why. I always kick your ass in video games, which must do wonders to your self-esteem. When was the last time you beat me in Mario Kart?"

"Shut up," he laughed, making his emerald eyes sparkle. "Truth is, your mum is an _amazing_ cook. Sorry to break it to you, but I'm only friends with you so I get free food."

"Damn it! I should have known you were after my mum! I mean, _really_ , I should have known. You've always been such a perv. I bet you actually have disgusting dreams about – _mmph!_ "

His hand flew to cover my mouth, causing my erupting laughter to be muffled against his hand, and he pushed my head back playfully. "You're absolutely terrible! And _I'm_ the perv? You _literally_ have a full-on body pillow of an anime character! I can only imagine what you do with it."

I gripped his wrist and forcefully pulled his hand away from my mouth. "Rude!" I exclaimed. "And also, don't put your hand near my mouth ever again. I don't even wanna know where those hands have been."

Completely oblivious to our surroundings, we were teasing each other and laughing so hard that we didn't even realise class had already started and everyone had turned to stare at us. Our oblivious bubble was popped by a booming, clearly irritated voice.

"Daniel! PJ! This is your last warning!" our history teacher threatened, causing PJ and me to sink down embarrassingly in our seats. "If you boys are going to keep talking through my lessons, I'll have to move you two apart."

"Sorry, Sir," we both said in unison. Our teacher grunted as a response and continued on with his lessons, while the class turned back to scribble down notes.

For a good fifteen minutes, PJ and I continued to listen to our history teacher while jotting down notes in dutiful silence, fearing Mr. Davidson's wrath again, until PJ had obviously gotten bored.

He started poking my arm with his pencil to get my attention. I silently huffed out a fake irritated breath and turned to him. _What?_ I mouthed to him, furrowing my eyebrows.

PJ rolled his eyes and slid a folded piece of notebook paper to me. I slowly opened it while keeping my eyes trained on our teacher, and glanced down at the note when Mr. Davidson's back was turned to us. Doodles that were way too artistic and detailed to actually be labelled as doodles filled the page, but I ignored them as my eyes went to the words scribbled on the paper.

_Forgot to bring up earlier. You seemed off at lunch today, what's on your mind?_

Oh yeah. Phil. When I was joking around with PJ earlier, I had completely forgotten about Phil. Knowing PJ for this long, he always had the ability to get things off my mind and make me feel better and happier. Which was so nice, as the entire day I feeling weirdly bad because of Phil. Phil, and his irritating expression. Did Phil always wear literally one expression on his face, and why did he do that? It was like he was just walking around almost mindlessly, and it was literally so weird.

I didn't know why I was so fixated on Phil's constant expressionless look. Maybe because I thought it was interesting when I saw glimpses of when he removed that mask for a couple seconds, and then he looked like an actual person? Although I didn't know him enough. I've talked to him for like two seconds. Perhaps he was genuinely shy and quiet, especially since he just moved here to a new place. Maybe he was just too nervous to show emotion right now, as if anyone would make fun of him for doing so.

I decided to push my frustrations aside. It was stupid, really, to have such thoughts about the new kid. So what, Phil was a little expressionless. So what, it was a little strange to me. Okay, it bothered me more than a bit to see no expression on someone. But I didn't have to be so rude about it. And to be honest, it really was none of my business. I barely knew the kid! Not even barely, I knew nothing about him. We only had like two conversations, and the conversations lasted probably about four sentences. And I was already judging him.

PJ waited patiently as I was talking to myself in my head, and he watched me furrowing my eyebrows at my irritation, to slowly letting the thoughtful consideration fall on my face. I bit the inside of my cheek as I quickly scribbled on his note, and passed it back to him.

_There's a new kid. Phil. Idk, I was just stupid earlier. I just thought he's really calm and expressionless – does that sound kinda mean? I guess it was just frustrating to see him be so calm and quiet and sorta bored, especially when everyone wanted to talk to him? Again, idk what I'm saying, this doesn't make sense. It doesn't matter._

I played with my thumbs while I tried to subtly watch PJ read the note. He pursed his lips and his eyebrows drew together in confusion. He jotted down something on the paper, and returned it to me.

_I'm sorry, but I don't get it?_

I nodded my head in agreement and slid the note with my newly written words back to him.

_I don't either._


	2. Chapter 2

After history had finished, students were packing up to go home and enjoy their Friday afternoons. Or they went to their clubs and lessons, which they actually genuinely enjoyed.

I had private singing lessons immediately after school. Although singing was a hobby that I truly enjoyed, singing lessons was an absolute chore. I still remembered my very first singing lesson, back when I was eleven and thought I was quite decent at singing until my singing teacher shattered those confident feelings by yelling at me for all of my unnoticed mistakes.

"Daniel, open your jaw more!"

"No, don't breathe there! Why would you breathe in the middle of a word? Hold that breath for another eight measures!"

"You know why this sounds boring? Because there's no dynamics! On measure 23, on the second 'away', you have to start soft – pianissimo! And then crescendo into a louder volume."

Christ, I was overwhelmed, and I didn't understand half the things she was yelling at me for. What the actual _hell_ were all these Italian words that she expected me to naturally know? Pianissimo? Fortissimo? Staccato? Legato? Tenuto? Fermata? I almost wanted to tear my hair out in frustration as she kept throwing these strange words at me. I wasn't Italian; that was PJ!

And then she kept criticising my posture and emphasising to stand up straight, as the diaphragm was "essential for singing". What the ever loving _shit_ did the damn _diaphragm_ have to do with singing?! I didn't even know what a diaphragm _was_ when I started singing lessons.

Now, I shook my head and smiled to myself, proud of how far I've gotten in singing and how much I've learned and improved over the years. However, although I didn't have the same annoyances that I had three years ago, nowadays singing was more of a chore. All I wanted to do was go to my forest and enjoy my time to myself. But instead, I had to prepare for yet another singing competition.

I didn't want to quit, though. I've already gotten this far, I've already worked this hard for singing for these past three years, that quitting would just halt me from learning more and prevent me from being one step closer to honing this ability in.

Eventually four-thirty sluggishly rolled by, and after I offered a quick goodbye to my singing teacher and shrugged on my backpack, I left my lessons and headed for the forest.

 _"'Come ready and see me, no matter how late. Come before the years run out.'"_ I continued singing the song I'd been reciting for the past hour, the song still daring to follow after me even after I finished my lessons.

 _"'But you must haste on foot or by sky. For no one can wait forever, under the bluest sky. I can't'_ – AH!"

Jesus on a fucking tricycle, what the hell?! I was so absorbed in my tune that I didn't even realise I had already walked to my destination, my distraction resulting in me tripping over a pair of legs and almost getting a mouthful of grass. Thankfully, I quickly regained my balance before I could fall onto my face and die of humiliation.

I whipped my head to the culprit of those death legs and started yelling at the person blindly, ignoring the knowledge that I was severely overreacting.

"Watch where you put your legs next time! I could've gotten hurt, you actual living flop! And why the hell are you here –"

Oh, shit. I immediately stopped yelling after I realised who I was yelling at. _Damn it,_ this was the second time I've encountered Phil in my hideout, and both times I've greeted him rudely with accusatory shouts.

"Sorry," we both said in unison, surprising each other and widening our eyes in confusion. "Why are _you_ sorry?" We asked that in unison too. I chuckled lightly and shook my head.

"Sorry for yelling at you again," I apologised sheepishly. "That was so uncalled for and I was definitely overreacting. I'm not really in the best mood when I have to go to lessons after school instead of coming here."

Phil smiled gently, his gaze lingering for a moment on my face and probably trying to decide if I was actually still mad at him, before shyly looking away. "Sorry for making you trip. Though I don't think you would've talked to me if you actually did land on your face."

I sat across from him, starting to pull books and homework out of my backpack. "That's not true, it was an accident anyways."

He shrugged, and looked down onto his notebook and continued on writing. I didn't really want the conversation to end there, though. If someone else was going to stay in my hideout with me, I would _like_ to at least get to know them a little first.

"You don't even _sound_ American," I eventually blurted out stupidly. Wow, what a great start to making friends, Dan. I didn't even mean for it to come out in such an accusatory way, but it did and I cringed. I wanted to take back what I thought about getting to know Phil. I wanted to just sit here in silence instead.

However, he didn't seem offended. Instead, he looked up at me in surprise which then morphed into a slight amusement. I studied him for a minute, hesitantly and uneasily. Even though Phil had a calm look on his face, it wasn't the dull, monotonous expression that I've seen him wear yesterday and today at school. He seemed relaxed and content even, not uninterested and expressionless.

"I've only lived in America for about five years, but I was born in Lancashire and grew up there until I was about ten."

I leaned back against a tree and opened up my maths exercise book, copying down the question onto a sheet of paper and trying to be occupied in something else while I listened to Phil. I resolved that it was easier to look at something else rather than watch Phil talk to me. "What made you move back to England? To London specifically?" I asked curiously.

"Family business," He replied shortly. I stayed silent, waiting for him to continue, but he didn't expand on it. I brushed it off quickly, and decided to change the subject before the silence extended long enough for awkwardness to seep in.

"Did you...like the first day at school here?" I offered timidly, hoping he didn't give me such a quick answer again.

He shrugged his shoulders again, and it didn't go unnoticed by me when his eyes shifted to look at me through his fringe. "Yeah, it was nice. The people were nice." He paused for a second, and he looked like he was debating on what to say next. He bit his bottom lip, as if trying to hold back his next words, before opening his mouth again. "Definitely nicer than you were when I met you."

My lips parted as my mouth dropped slightly to gape at him. I felt my face burning up in embarrassment and guilt. And irritation. I knew I wasn't the nicest I could have been yesterday, but I didn't yell at him _that_ much. Granted, I was still rude for not trying to strike up a conversation or something yesterday, instead just sitting there grouchily while staring off into the forest. But I wasn't _that_ mean. And I already felt guilty enough for being a _little_ rude to him, but I didn't need to be reminded about it. Still, I flickered my eyes up to his and started to apologise.

"About that, yeah, I'm really sorry –"

I cut myself off as soon as I saw his face. He literally didn't seem mad at all. Phil was still biting his bottom lip, and it hit me that it wasn't because of a nervous tendency for trying to talk to me. It was quite the opposite of nervousness, actually; he was trying to hold in his goddamn laughter. Was he _teasing_ me? Amusement sparkled in his eyes and he raised both of his eyebrows slightly at my unfinished apology. He was getting a kick out of my uncomfortable guilt, and was failing miserably on hiding it.

I was so confused on what was happening. "...You little shit," I finally muttered disbelievingly. My eyes widened in alarm when he ducked his head and his shoulders started to shake, and it took me a moment to realise that he was _laughing_. Stunned and not knowing how to react, I stared at him while he silently giggled. He eventually lifted his head and allowed me to process his face, taking in the little crinkles that formed at the edges of his smiling eyes, the glimmering white teeth that were displayed by his grin, the small pink tongue poking out from the corner of his mouth.

My wide eyes didn't shrink in size as I waited for him to stop laughing. When his laughter finally progressed into a smile, I relaxed my shoulders. It was quite unnerving seeing Phil's mood tip so far into the happy side of the scale, when all I've seen on his face were small smiles, expressionless looks, and discomfort.

I internally smacked myself. I _knew_ I had judged him too early. I literally knew nothing about Phil. He probably was just sad he moved into a new area yesterday, and was nervous when he came to school today. That's why he looked like he couldn't be bothered by anything and anyone. But now he was laughing. And fucking _laughter_ was normal on anybody. And I shouldn't have judged him to be any bloody different.

"There were a lot of emotions on your face just now. What are you thinking about?"

His voice broke my thoughts and I blinked rapidly, trying to focus on the situation in front of me. "That you look different when you laugh," I blurted out. When his eyebrows drew together in confusion, I ducked my head in embarrassment and glued my eyes onto the maths question sitting in front of me. That wasn't supposed to come out. God, I needed to go home and sleep or something. I hated not knowing what to do and I hated saying the wrong things.

"What do you mean?" he asked. My eyes flickered up to his before looking down again, not having the courage to meet his eyes completely. He was tilting his head to the side and looking at me curiously.

"I meant 'different' in a good way," I mumbled hesitantly. I sighed before I continued talking, or at least _trying_ to talk coherently. "I don't really know you at all, and I haven't seen you laugh or... or look too happy yet. Which is understandable, who's happy to move anyways, right? I guess it was just different seeing you laugh, which I haven't seen yet. It's nice."

From the corners of my eyes, I saw him shifting in his place. I really hoped he wasn't shifting because I made him uncomfortable. Curiosity overcame me, and I glanced up at him. He was shifting _closer_ to me, not shifting away in discomfort. Instinctively, I started to lean back against the tree.

When he was sitting right in front of me, close enough for our knees to be in contact, he stopped moving. I didn't know when I tensed up again. A friendly and affable smile played on his face. A bell in my head screamed at me at this strange new situation. Should I just try to forget my preconceived impressions about Phil and just go along with this...friendlier Phil? I quickly decided onto doing just that, trying to push away my first impressions of this kid. I barely knew him, and I decided I would much rather get to know someone who was friendly than someone who seemed reserved and bored.

My eyes travelled across his face, trying to understand what he was doing and what the hell he wants and why he had moved closer to me. And then my eyes reached his. And oh god. Were they something.

It wasn't as if I had never seen pretty eyes before. In fact, I was quite envious of any pair of eyes that were lively and unique and full of colour and character. PJ's eyes, for instance, were such a striking shade of green, a bright and entrancing shade of green that captivated you forever. You never wanted to look away from them. One of my ex-girlfriends' eyes were greyish-blue, and had the amazing ability to change colour depending on the lighting or her mood. It remained one of the most fascinating things when they changed into a silver-grey colour, or transformed into a dark sapphire shade. It was like a story existed behind those eyes that you didn't know about but had the desire to uncover.

And now, Phil's eyes were definitely added to this creepy list of pretty eyes. Hell, his eyes ranked at the top of the list. Although blue was the colour prominently present, it wasn't the only pigment in his eyes. Blue largely traced the rims of his irises. The blue gradated into a bright green in the middle of the iris, the section in between the border of his iris and the border of his pupil. Lastly, Phil held a striking amount of gold around his pupils. His eyes were blue and green and gold all at once.

His eyes were the colours of my skies. The sky, the feature of this hideout that I loved the most, had the exact same colours that were present in his eyes.

And god, I hated it. My eyes were like the bloody _mud_ here. Definitely not an aspect I liked. In fact, the mud was probably the feature I hated the most here. I hated when it rained and suddenly I didn't feel the luscious soft grass anymore, but instead felt the stupid mud soaking and staining my jeans.

"Did you know that dog spit is cleaner than human spit?"

Crap, I really had to stop zoning out. I shook my head slightly to clear my thoughts and return to reality, blinking quickly to help with the process.

"What does that have to do with anything?" I questioned, not even bothering to conceal the confusion that travelled into my voice. Did I miss a part of a conversation because I was too busy staring at his damn eyes? Where the hell did that unusual fact come from?

He chuckled at my confusion. "You said you didn't know anything about me," he started to explain. "Well, if there's two things you should know about me, it's that I know a lot of useless random information. And I love animals."

 _And that you're absolutely strange,_ I thought to myself. Nevertheless, I couldn't help the smile slowly taking over my face at his silly comments. It must have triggered a reaction within Phil, because he started to grin widely. He raised his hand and shyly poked at the large indent my smile created on my left cheek.

"Your dimple is _huge_. I wish I had a dimple," he remarked while I let him repeatedly prod at it. "Wait, you have _two_ dimples?" He raised his other hand to poke the smaller dimple on my right cheek. "Though this dimple isn't as big as the one on the left side. This one," he put more pressure onto the bigger dimple by pushing his finger on it more, "is a pretty intense one."

I laughed as he continued jabbing at my face. "Stop touching my face, you weirdo," I jokingly whined and decided it was a good time to slap his hands away. He pouted his lips but it quickly morphed back into a smile.

"Your turn," he simply said.

I tilted my head, not knowing what he was getting at. Did he want me to start poking his face as well? "My turn? My turn for what?"

He feigned an agitated groan, though he was failing to suppress his smile. "Your turn to tell me something about yourself. Because I don't know anything about you either."

Oh. I sat there silently for a moment, trying to dig through anything and everything about me. How do I just pick one thing to tell someone you just met? And quite frankly, I wasn't that interesting. I would describe myself as quite driven, always trying to stay on top of schoolwork as well as my other lessons and activities. School and lessons occupied the majority of my life, but I doubt my determination in succeeding in my academics and extracurricular activities was what Phil had in mind for this impromptu introduction.

"I can...rotate both of my wrists an entire three hundred sixty degrees," I finally offered. I didn't know what else to say. That was my sole party trick, and probably the only interesting thing I could do.

Phil's mouth hung open and his eyes widened with disbelief. "No way," he marvelled incredulously. "You have to show me, because I definitely don't believe you."

I unthinkingly flashed him a wide grin as I took my exercise book from my lap and shoved it aside with all of my other materials to make space for my demonstration. Phil watched me warily as I stretched out my arms high above my head and cracked a couple of my knuckles, trying to loosen the joints in my arms and hands. After rolling and shrugging my shoulders a couple times, I deemed myself as ready.

I placed my right hand flat on the grass. I used my left hand to rotate my right wrist around, causing my arm to twist as well. Eventually, my wrist was completely turned three hundred sixty degrees. "Can you help me twist my other arm?" I called to him. I turned to face Phil, and almost broke down in laughter at the alarmed and bothered looks dancing across his face.

"I don't really want to," he muttered, yet complied and tentatively placed his hands on my left wrist, twisting my arm by mimicking how I had previously pivoted my right arm around.

When both of my arms were rotated, I kept my position motionless to make sure that Phil could observe my wrists to ensure that they were in fact swivelled a full three sixty. I couldn't identify which facial expression dominated his face; it was a battle between wonder and disturbed.

I decided to restore normalcy to this situation again. I lifted my hands from the grass, immediately making my wrists swiftly snap back into their natural position. Phil emitted an uncomfortable noise. "You're like a hand exorcist," he announced, flabbergasted. "I thought your hands were going to snap off or something."

The laughter that I've been trying to keep in finally escaped my mouth. "I'm not gonna lie," I chortled. "You looked pretty terrified. You sure you're okay?"

Phil slowly let out a breathy laugh. "Yeah, I'm fine. That was interesting, but also just strange. Which is always the best combination to anything."

"Well, not _anything_ ," I countered. "I'm sure you wouldn't want some random stranger coming up to you and offering you 'strange but interesting' looking chocolate and telling you to get into their white minivan if you wanted it."

"Knowing me, I would be too focused on that chocolate and would gladly get into that minivan before I could even think about how sketchy that situation is."

"Oh god, you're hopeless. Someone's going to kidnap you and you'll mysteriously disappear before I even get to know you."

Phil's tongue poked out of his mouth as he giggled. "I'm hopeless _and_ clumsy. And since I really like this spot and I don't think you're going to leave this place any time soon, I'm sure it'll be great having me around. Especially when I get to trip over my own feet and land on my face."

I snorted. "That would actually be so funny to watch. I will _definitely_ spend time with you more if I get to see that."

He grinned at me widely, his face completely full of contentment and delight. His smile was fucking infectious, because I felt a huge smile on my face as well. I didn't even realise how large my smile was as we kept messing around until I felt my cheeks aching.

We continued joking around and making each other laugh, completely oblivious to the time quickly running by. It was when darkness blanketed the sky that jolted me back into reality.

"I think I have to go," I told Phil regretfully. I was actually sad to leave. Hanging out with Phil today was strangely loads of fun, especially when he opened up and started talking to me. "My parents are going to kill me, I have to wake up early for tutoring tomorrow."

I started to pack my books, and realised that I didn't even get any work done today. "Wow, Phil. You're a terrible influence. You distracted me from doing my maths homework!"

He rolled his eyes. "I was helping you live! Who actually does homework on a _Friday?_ "

"I do! Don't mock my methods."

He groaned, but the amusement was evident in his voice. "You're such a nerd." He muttered warmly, shaking his head slightly.

"And _you're_ weird, but I like you anyways."

He smiled while watching me pack my belongings, but it slowly faded as his next words hesitantly tumbled out. "Can I..." he started, but paused and ran a hand through his hair. "Will I... can I still see you tomorrow?"

I heard Phil's uncertain tone as I had just finished packing. I almost wanted to scoff and reprimand him. "Of course you will, you –" I didn't finish that sentence with my mocking tone as soon as I turned to see his face. He looked like the shy new kid I met yesterday, not the teasing, funny Phil I've gotten to know today. He was fidgeting with the corners of his notebook paper, and seemed to avoid looking at me.

I repeated my sentence in a softer, fonder tone. "Of course you will, you spork," I assured him lightly. "You really don't have a choice. Whether you like it or not, I'm still coming back to this place. You're actually going to get annoyed by me very quickly."

The corner of his lips twitched upwards briefly. "I doubt that," he muttered under his breath, almost inaudibly. "You're going to be the one getting annoyed by _me_." Unlike me, he didn't put any humour into his words.

I didn't exactly know how to appropriately respond to that. Usually I was the one with self-deprecating thoughts and everyone around me just told me how wrong I was by pointing out my better qualities. However, I didn't know Phil enough to point out his good qualities to cheer him up.

I eventually sighed and put my backpack down. I moved to sit right next to him, then turned my head to look at him. "I _did_ just say that I like you. So for now," I nudged at his shoulder so he could glance up at me, "shut up and don't worry about me getting annoyed with you. You made me laugh a _lot_ today. And usually only my close friends can make me laugh that much. I don't think I could ever actually get annoyed with a person who pretty much shares my sense of humour."

He turned to look at me. He opened his mouth as if wanting to say something, but he seemed to change his mind as no words came out. Shaking his head, he ended up looking away from me again, but not before I saw the small smile planted on his face.

"You have to get going, but I'll see you tomorrow then?" he eventually asked timidly.

I faked an annoyed huff, and nudged his shoulder again harder. " _Yes_ , Phil." I got up and shrugged my backpack on and spun to look at him one last time before heading home. "I had fun today, and I'm glad I got to know you. I'll see you tomorrow, Phil." I flashed him a grin.

"Bye, Dan," Phil called out as I headed out.

Yesterday I walked home harbouring guilty feelings after my encounter with Phil. It really was surprising and amazing how much twenty four hours completely altered those thoughts.


	3. Chapter 3

After all of my activities were finished for the weekend, I spent the majority of my time in the forest as per usual, except this time my usual pattern had a pleasant alteration.

Phil and I passed most of our time lying on our stomachs on the soft grass with textbooks and homework sprawled out in front of us. As Phil was new to this school, I tried to help him as much as I could with subjects he was struggling to catch up with such as mathematics and history. However, after Phil had quickly gotten more comfortable and open around me, it took me longer than usual to finish homework or get any work done as we both ended up getting distracted and making each other laugh with stupid jokes. We joked around comfortably and easily as if we have known each other for four months, not four days.

"Dan! Who even wrote this history textbook?" Phil exclaimed loudly.

I finished up jotting down notes from my own history textbook and glanced up at him, confused at his sudden amusement. "What do you mean?"

"'The loss of the Seven Years War in 1763 left Britain to juggle with a grand financial octopus,'" Phil read from his textbook. He put his face in his hands, causing his laughter to be muffled. "What does that even _mean_?"

"'A grand financial octopus?'" I laughed as I reread the exact same quote in my textbook. "I can't believe I missed that!"

Phil giggled. "Could you imagine actually trying to juggle an octopus?"

"Octopi are heavy, Phil! You can't juggle octopi, especially not with _those_ arms." I poked his thin arm with my pencil.

"Please, Dan, I could beat you at arm wrestling."

"Try me," I challenged.

He giggled again as he got into the arm wrestling position, with one elbow propped on the grass at a ninety degree angle. I raised my eyebrows and grinned at him, setting my materials aside and leaning over and bending my own arm in a right angle. I manoeuvred my hand into his and we clasped onto each other tightly.

"Alright, ready?" he asked in a haughty tone. I nodded as a confirmation. He immediately started a mini countdown. "3...2...1...Go!"

Being a semi-competitive swimmer, I thought I'd have a slight advantage and easily beat Phil in this arm wrestling match. However, the more force I applied to bring his arm down, the more he counteracted my pressure by pushing back with a surprising amount of strength. He was a lot stronger than he looked, but not strong enough to bring me down.

For a while, we couldn't budge our hands to be pushed onto the ground. We sat there, flushed and red-faced and gritted teeth, as we tried to force our interlinked hands to be thrusted down onto the side of the other person.

"Oh my god," I heaved out a breathy laugh.

"This is so hard," Phil uttered through gritted teeth. "Neither of us are making any progress!"

"If you relax, I can bring your arm down and we can end this quicker?" I teased Phil, smirking at him mischievously.

"Shut up, Dan," he countered with a shaky breath.

Our arms refused to budge as Phil and I continued to apply equal amounts of force from both of our sides for a couple minutes. I could feel sweat dripping down my forehead, and noticed Phil's face glistening with a sheen of sweat as well. Eventually, after a couple minutes of applying as much pressure as we could, our strengths began to waver. And that was when my swimmer advantages kicked in.

I felt Phil's strength falter, but my stamina still held out. I mustered my remaining energy and forced down Phil's resisting arm onto the grass.

"Crap!" he yelled when our hands hit the ground on his side.

I laughed in delight and decided to mock him about it, but my own wrist starting to throb a bit. "Bloody hell, I can't even gloat. My wrist is aching!" I exclaimed while rubbing at it. "Christ, Phil, you're a lot stronger than you look."

He moved to lie down on the grass again on his stomach. "I mean, I'm not _that_ unfit. I used to play baseball in America," he giggled as he rested his cheek on the grass and looked up at me. "Though I kinda sucked at it. I was actually surprised I held out for that long with you, to be honest."

I scrunched up my face. "Baseball? Isn't that the American rip-off of rounders?"

He rolled his eyes. "I bet you've never even seen a baseball match. Baseball isn't a rip-off of rounders, but they do have some similarities."

"Well, I don't know anything about either baseball or rounders. Sorry. The only sport I care about is swimming."

"Do you swim?" I nodded at his question. "How long have you been swimming for?"

I shrugged. "Not that long, only about three years."

He rolled over on the grass so his back was on the ground, and he placed his hands behind his head and watched me. "You always tell me you have lessons. How many things do you do, Dan?"

I laid down on the grass next to him and turned to look at him. I shrugged again. "I swim, sing, and play the piano. Though on top of that, I have extra advanced mathematics lessons on Thursdays, which are _so much fun_. And I get to tutor some younger kids on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays."

"Wow, that's impressive," he murmured incredulously. He closed his eyes while resting his head on his hands. "Though tutoring and _more_ maths doesn't sound like too much fun."

"Tutoring is alright. I like working with kids, when they aren't being too snobby. And I get paid for tutoring, actually! Twenty pounds an hour."

Phil's eyes flew open, and he stared at me in disbelief. " _Twenty pounds_ an hour?!"

I laughed at his astonishment. "Yup! It's great, I tutor kids from the wealthier families in my neighbourhood. But I just spend most of my money on video games and food." I decided to switch the topic. Discussing my schedule can get quite tedious. "As _interesting_ as talking about my schedule is, I'd rather talk about something else." I said, pouting my lips.

He reached out and poked my pouted bottom lip, which caused me to yelp and rub my lips violently to get the germs off. "Phil!" I exclaimed. "Don't touch my mouth, your hands are probably dirty!"

He groaned impatiently. "Dan, you're not going to die!" He watched me with amusement as I continued to scrub my lips with the sleeve of my jumper. "Wow I'm sorry, I'll never touch you again."

I chuckled at his mock hurt. "It's just that we've been outside all day, Phil."

"If you're going to react like that when my _finger_ pokes your lip, you're going to be so much fun when a girl tries to kiss you someday."

I rolled my eyes as I finished scrubbing my lips. "I've kissed girls before." I argued. I was instantaneously taken back to the memory of my first kiss and cringed.

He grinned when he saw me wince. "Please do tell. You just looked like you're about to vomit."

I groaned and covered my face with my hands, but complied. "The first time I kissed a girl was when I was eleven. I was playing 'Spin the Bottle' with the 'cool' kids and the bottle landed on me and a girl named Alex." I shuddered as I remembered how _slobbery_ the kiss had been. "When I went in for the kiss, I realised I didn't really know what I was doing, and neither did she. So for a full minute we just ended up...kinda...licking each other's faces and mouths. Everyone stared at us mortified."

I've known Phil for a good four days, and so far I was convinced that my discomfort was what he found the most entertaining. Because right now he was clutching his stomach and laughing hysterically. I shoved his shoulder and tried to be angry with him. "Don't laugh, this is serious!" But his laughter was contagious and I couldn't help the smile growing on my face.

"That is _gold_ ," he giggled as he wiped the fake tears out of his eyes. "That's worse than mine. The first girl I kissed _rated_ me."

My eyes widened in disbelief. "Rated you?"

His laughter died down a bit, though a huge smile still remained on his face. "Yeah, it was earlier this year actually. I got together with my first girlfriend through MSN and we broke up through MSN. I was complaining to her that I wanted to get good at kissing, and she told me she'd give me kissing lessons if we were dating. She liked me and it took me a while to get the hint that she wanted me to ask her out."

I propped myself on my elbow and snickered as Phil recounted his story. "So what happened when you got kissing lessons?"

He let out an uncomfortable laugh. "She gave me a five."

My eyes widened and I started to tease him. "Five out of five? Wow, Phil, no need to brag –"

"Five out of _ten_ , Dan."

I couldn't hold it back anymore. I burst out laughing, and he joined in immediately.

"Oh my god!" I wheezed out through my fits of laughter. "That's hilarious!"

"It was embarrassing!" Like me, he tried to be cross, but ended up failing as another wave of hysterical fits erupted from him.

I watched a small pink tongue poke out of the corner of his mouth. He covered his mouth with his hand to hide his grin. His shoulders were shaking and his eyes were dancing with happiness. I watched the pink in his cheeks blossoming into a rosier shade.

I didn't know how long I was staring, or why I was staring in the first place. I didn't remember when I stopped laughing, and I didn't realise how wide I've been smiling instead until my cheeks started to ached.

It was when Phil stopped laughing and the silence surrounded us that I realised I've been creepily studying him for an unconventionally long time. Phil was staring back at me, relaxed and content, with a smile still planted on his face.

"Come sit with me at lunch tomorrow at school," I randomly blurted out. I surprised myself by saying that. It wasn't as if that request was inappropriate or embarrassing per se, but my mind had been far from school and lunch. My mind had been on Phil's laughter instead.

His wide smile slowly faded at my random request. Confusion eclipsed the happiness in his eyes. "What?"

"Sit with me at lunch tomorrow," I repeated firmly. Now that I thought about it, I did want to hang around with Phil more. It was rather nice seeing him this carefree. His thoughts and humour blended with mine so well, and if he could make me laugh so much, then he would surely fit in with my friends as well. "You're really cool and funny. I want to introduce you to my friends, I'm sure you'd get along with them easily."

He shifted uncomfortably on the grass, and after a while he sat up and looked at me, chewing on his bottom lip. "I don't know," he started to say. "I don't know if your friends would like me. You said it yourself, I'm weird –"

I cut him off quickly. "Phil, _I'm_ weird too. And they're all weird. And I wouldn't be suggesting this if I knew that you wouldn't fit in with my friends. If you get along with me, you'll get along with them. I'm literally the least sociable and outgoing person in my group."

He seemed to be hesitant on agreeing. He continued to chew his lip, succeeding on making it acquire a dark rosy tone. "Please," I pleaded, determined to have him join me tomorrow.

"I'm really shy, though. I don't know how well I'll fit in."

"Phil, I swear we're not going to bite your head off. My friends are actually really nice. They'll love you," I promised. I was quite adamant about this. He became so comfortable and friendly with me in such a short time, I was sure he would be able to enjoy attending school more if he had more friends by his side.

He released his lip from the hold of his teeth, and started to nod slowly. "Okay," he whispered shyly. I beamed and reached over to clasp his hands in mine, giving them a small squeeze of reassurance.

"Hey, the worst thing that could happen is that you'll be stuck with only me. But that's not going to happen, everyone'll love you."

\- x -

I was thrilled that I would be able to say "I told you so" to Phil later. Because I told him so. Everyone loved him.

On Monday, I greeted my usual lunch table with Phil trailing behind me. "Hey losers," I acknowledged my friends as I gently grabbed Phil's elbow and maneuvered him to stand next to me. "This is Phil, the new kid. He's in my maths lesson. He'll be sitting with us today."

PJ immediately pulled up an extra chair and offered it to Phil. "Hey! Nice to meet you, Phil. I'm PJ," he introduced with a friendly grin on his face. I saw Phil visibly relax a bit and he shuffled to timidly take a seat between PJ and my friend Jack.

"I'm Phil," I heard a tentative voice next to me utter.

"Move over, Howard," I shoved Jack playfully so he could surrender his seat to me. He muttered something under his breath, but obeyed and scooted over to the empty seat next to him that was originally reserved for me.

Everyone immediately began to hurl their names at Phil in attempts to introduce themselves, but the situation ended up with everyone talking over one another and Phil shrinking in his seat while being bombarded by introductions.

"Guys, shut up!" I laughed, shaking my head a bit in amusement.

PJ produced an entertained chuckle as well. "You're going to scare Phil off. Just go around the table and say your names like our teachers made us do in primary school. Starting with Chris."

"Getting the best out of the way first, I see," Chris winked at PJ, which almost went unnoticed as his brown fringe swept over and covered his eyes. "I'm the one and only Chris Kendall, and..." he bore his eyes onto Phil for a moment, studying him as if he were an alien with three heads. Phil sunk further down into his chair under Chris's scrutiny. Chris's lips twisted mischievously into a smirk. "...and you're _cute_."

I snorted at Chris's comment and cracked up harder when I witnessed Phil's face rapidly flushing into a bright red shade. Chuckles as well as irritated groans at Chris's remark spread throughout our table. "Chris!" Louise scolded in a harsh tone, though her turquoise eyes sparkled with laughter. "He just moved here! Don't flirt with the poor boy just yet!"

Chris raised his hands in front of his chest as a sign of surrender. "I'm not! If anything, Phil's gonna be competition here with getting the ladies." He flipped the brown hair out of his eyes, revealing his hazel eyes that were gleaming with a playfully wicked glint. "Though he's never gonna be any competition against me."

"Yeah, your lack of girlfriends in your life really proves your point," Dean deadpanned, shaking his head vigorously which caused some of his thick portions of brown hair to fly in different directions.

Everyone hooted at Dean's comment, and Phil gradually relaxed and presented a grin on his lips. Chris's cheeks blossomed into a pink shade as he muttered "shut up", which generated more laughter from the table.

"Chris, sweetie, you're hopeless," Louise sighed fondly. She turned to Phil and flashed him a huge smile. "Sorry about him, he's terrible. No one really likes him."

"Hey!" Chris shouted in an offended tone.

Louise ignored him and continued to smile at Phil. "I'm Louise, nice to meet you. Are you liking school here so far?"

Phil nodded, offering a smile in return. "I like school here, but I think I like your hair more," Phil complimented, pointing at Louise's blonde hair, which was covered in sparkling beads and ornaments, giving off an effect of glittering hair.

She beamed, thrilled with Phil's compliment. "Thanks! I want to dye it pink at the ends, but we're not allowed to have 'eccentric coloured hair' here. Maybe I could dye it in two years when we go to sixth form."

"It'll look so weird," Jack muttered.

"It won't look weird!" Louise promised. "Just wait and see."

Jack rolled his eyes and turned to Phil. "I'm Jack Howard, definitely the normal one in this group." Jack was anything but completely normal; he was as sarcastic and strange like the rest of us. Although his personality bounced off all of ours fittingly, his appearance was the most different from the rest of the guys here. Chris, PJ, Dean and I all sported brown hair with fringes swept over our eyes, but Jack had blond hair that was styled into a quiff. He also occasionally wore thick black-rimmed glasses when he couldn't bother putting in his contact lenses in the mornings.

"And I'm Dean," he butted in before Jack could continue talking. "Heard you moved from America, mate?"

Phil nodded, looking down and playing with his untouched sandwich.

Dean put his elbows on the table and cupped his chin in one of his hands. "Where in America did you live in?"

"Manhattan. In New York."

Chris might as well did a spit-take with his drink. " _Manhattan?!_ Isn't that one of the most expensive cities to live in America?"

I raised my eyebrows in surprise as well. Phil had lived in Manhattan? But Phil literally had his eyes ready to fall out of his sockets yesterday when I told him that I make twenty pounds an hour for tutoring?

"I always wanted to go to New York," PJ gushed, his eyes glazing with daydreams of his fantasy.

Chris ignored him, continuing to stare at Phil with eyes bright with awe and fascination. "You lived in Manhattan?" he repeated with a softer tone.

Phil presented a smile on his lips, but it didn't reach his eyes. "My family's business was in Manhattan."

"What kind of business does your family do?" Jack asked.

"Investment banks."

I munched on my sandwich silently while keeping my eyes trained on Phil. _He really doesn't like talking about moving here from America,_ I thought, studying him shift uncomfortably and watching the expressionless look threatening to mask his face. Strange. It must be a personal topic to him.

Thankfully, Louise cut in before this conversation advanced further. "Enough about Phil's family, what do you like to do for fun?"

The smile that curved Phil's lips finally appeared in his eyes. "I like playing video games, writing, and listening to music."

Video games. Now _there's_ a topic that sparked everyone's interest. For the remaining twenty minutes of lunch, discussions about our favourite video games as well as haughty bragging rights about how advanced we were in particular games occupied our conversations. "No one can ever beat me in Mario Kart," I sang condescendingly.

"That's because you cheat, Dan!" Chris accused, huffing his chest.

"No, I don't! Just because _you_ suck ass in Mario Kart, doesn't mean that _I'm_ cheating!"

Phil was laughing along with the rest of us. For the rest of our lunchtime, he seemed to loosen up and feel more comfortable around us, though not as carefree and open as he was with me this weekend. Nevertheless, my friends appeared to really enjoy his company, especially after he approved of our favourite video games by revealing that those were his favourite games as well.

"Phil, come over to my place this weekend!" PJ offered, a welcoming smile placed on his face. "We're all just going to get together and play video games and eat loads of food. It'll be great, I promise." Phil agreed with a gigantic grin, his face lit with joy.

I excused myself to go to the toilets, my head feeling giddy for doing _something_ right. I managed to convince Phil to meet my friends, and they accepted him immediately and got along with him easily.

I was washing my hands in the toilets when I heard the door opening and closing behind me. I didn't bother looking up to regard my new company, instead walked towards the opposite wall from the door to retrieve some paper towels.

Suddenly, a pair of arms wrapped around my waist and hugged me tightly from behind. I stiffened. My heart might as well had leapt out of my throat at the unexpected hold. A chin rested on my shoulder. A nose nuzzled the sensitive area of my neck, causing me to involuntarily gasp. Exhalations of breaths warmed up the junction between my neck and shoulder.

"Thank you, Dan," a familiar bashful voice murmured into my neck, causing his lips to move lightly against it. I shivered, turning my head slightly so he wouldn't be touching my neck as much, and instead rested my forehead on top of his head. I wanted to make Phil comfortable and open, especially around me, so I let him hug me. I forced my body to relax and leaned back into him.

"For what?" My voice was slightly muffled by his hair which tickled my lips.

"For being so nice to me," he replied, burying his face further into the area above my collarbones. "For being such a good friend. I haven't even known you for a week, but you've still been so unbelievably supportive and kind. And then you helped me make more friends so I wouldn't be that awkward, lonely new kid. And I appreciate that. I appreciate you."

My cheeks flared up at his gratitude. I tried to will it down, but the heat refused to subdue. It wasn't as if no one had ever displayed their appreciation for me before. However, my mind collided with a wall when attempting to recall a time when someone has expressed _this_ much appreciation merely through the immense sincerity in their voice and the firm tight grip of their arms.

"Phil, you don't need to thank me," I released a shaky laugh. I didn't know how to react to his earnest gratitude. Nevertheless, I slowly raised a hand and placed it lightly on one of the arms that was wrapped around me. "I didn't do anything except talk to you and force you to meet my friends. It was really nothing."

I felt him shaking his head. "Have you ever been the new kid, Dan? It's terrifying. You don't know anyone or anything. You have to do everything by yourself. You have to learn new material to catch up in lessons by yourself. You have to try to find people you _think_ you might fit in with by yourself. You have to get the courage to walk down the corridors without anyone by your side." His arms gripped me tighter. "But you've been nice enough to help me with all this. And I appreciate it so much, Dan. So thank you."

It didn't feel fair or appropriate to argue that I didn't do anything very extraordinary. Because he was right: I never was the new kid at school. I didn't truly know the impact I was having on someone who was new. During Reception, I was too young to even care whether or not I had friends. Then I met PJ a few weeks before I entered Year One when he moved into my neighbourhood. Throughout primary and secondary school, he was always by my side. I couldn't even imagine how alone and lost someone could get if they arrived to a new school.

I turned my head and rested my cheek on top of his head and sighed softly. "You're welcome, Phil. I –"

"Phil! I never got a chance to get your number –" The loud new voice cut off his own sentence from behind us. Phil and I flinched at the unexpected voice and jumped up in alarm, the process causing Phil to completely release me, and we spun around to PJ.

I witnessed PJ's cheeks gradually flushing into a pink shade. His lips were pursed and his eyebrows were scrunched together in confusion, trying to assemble the situation he walked in on. He locked his eyes with mine, and titled his head ever-so-slightly as if to say _"what is going on?"_

He coughed. "Did I...interrupt something?"

What _I_ was confused about was why PJ sounded so _guilty_. Or why this situation felt so packed with awkward tension. He was fidgeting with the black tie of his uniform nervously, while keeping his eyes focused on me. From the corner of my eye, I could see that Phil's face had also gone red. Should I feel awkward for some reason too?

"No? You're fine. Lessons start in five minutes, so we were going to leave soon anyways." I responded cautiously, completely puzzled by my red-faced friends around me.

PJ slowly nodded, then his eyes shifted to fall on Phil. "Hey, Phil?"

Phil lifted his head to transfer his gaze from the ground to PJ. "Yeah?" He asked in a small voice.

The embarrassed colour speckled on PJ's cheeks was slowly fading. PJ gave Phil a smile and shoved his phone towards him. "Here, I forgot to ask for your number earlier. I'll text you my address and the time you can come over for this weekend."

\- x -

"You know, Chris is one of our closest friends. And he's bisexual. I'm not homophobic." That was the first thing PJ said to me when I sat down next to him in history.

I didn't respond immediately, not realising that the comment had been directed to me until I turned and caught him watching me expectedly.

"Huh? What does that have to do with anything?"

"Dan, we've known each other for almost ten years," he offered me a small smile and lifted one of his shoulders. "You can tell me anything."

"What are you talking about? I _do_ tell you everything?" Well, all except the topic of my hiding spot. He knew that I had somewhere to go when I felt low, but he always assumed that it was my room. I never corrected him.

He drew his eyebrows together and studied me. He seemed to be confused on why _I_ was confused. "What happened between you and Phil earlier in the toilets?"

Did he suddenly feel ignored and uninformed because I didn't immediately disclose Phil's conversation to PJ? "Phil was just thanking me for helping him make new friends."

PJ gave an unsatisfied look to my answer. He opened his mouth to say something, but quickly closed it again. He nodded and transferred his focus onto his notebook, opening it up for doodling.

I watched him, feeling so incomplete and perplexed. "Peej," I gently asked him. "What's on your mind?"

He pursed his lips, not answering my question for a moment, before looking back at me. "Weren't you... kissing Phil earlier?"

I blinked, startled by his question. Where did _that_ come from? I didn't think I heard him correctly. "Kissing Phil?" I cautiously asked. Why was I constantly being drowned in confusion today? PJ nodded, causing me to frown. "No, that didn't happen? Why would you think that?"

He offered me another supportive smile. "Dan, you can tell me anything. I'm never going to make fun of you or –"

"PJ, what the _hell_ are you on about?" My frown deepened, seriously disliking the lack of context I was receiving from PJ's concerns.

"If you like boys, I'm not going to think of you any differently," he paused for a moment, pursed his lips for the millionth time, then shook his head. "But I'm being a dick for trying to pressure you to come out to me. I know Chris absolutely hated being bombarded –"

"PJ!" I exclaimed, but my voice got drowned out by the sudden shrieking of the school bell, indicating for lessons to start. I began to whisper harshly at PJ as lessons started. "PJ, where on earth did _that_ come from? I don't like boys."

"But then why were you kissing Phil earlier?"

My mind raced in attempts to find pieces of this puzzle. Why did he keep _saying_ that? "No, I –" And then realisation dawned on me.

When Phil was hugging me earlier, both of our backs were turned to the door, and that wouldn't provide a clear profile of our faces to anyone who would've walked in. Our faces were pretty close to each other, with mine on his head and his rested near my neck. It hit me that the proximity of our faces might have suggested something else completely.

I turned my head to the side to avert PJ's gaze, but not before PJ saw my appearance, and I knew that my sudden rosiness of my cheeks gave away my discomfort. "Wow, Peej, that's awkward. Phil was only hugging me."

There was an awkward pause. "Oh," he said simply. I sneaked a peek to PJ. He didn't wear that unsatisfied expression anymore, but rather had an embarrassed look loitering his face. "Sorry, I probably just confused you loads then."

I released a breathy chuckle, and rolled my shoulder a bit to relax myself from the tension PJ had unintentionally built up for me. "A bit, yeah. Peej, _Louise_ hugs me like that. And you never accused me of kissing her."

We both dropped the conversation for a couple minutes, attempting to catch up on the first few minutes of history lessons that we've missed in the midst of confusing each other. Then he murmured something inaudibly, a small smile plastered on his face.

"Sorry, what was that?" I whispered.

"I said Phil seemed really nice. Really quiet and nervous though. Didn't you tell me he was expressionless on Friday? Reminds me of when Chris moved here four years ago."

I snorted. "And look at Chris now."

He grinned. "I'm really excited for Saturday. I can't wait for Phil to break out of his shell like Chris did."

\- x -

The next few weeks quickly morphed into months, allowing Phil's shyness to quickly morph into carefree ease. His eyes were now lit bright with happiness and amusement, and he always brought the most ridiculous stories into our group that made us all clutch onto our stomachs. "A man woofed in my ear today," he whined one Saturday afternoon as soon as he walked into Chris's house.

He constantly wore a bright grin on his face, and it triggered smiles on all of our lips. Even Jack, who normally lingered a bit on the grouchy side of the scale, had trouble keeping his lips curved down when Phil was with us.

Everyone rapidly grew attached to Phil, and Phil developed amazing friendships with the six of us. He especially grew fond of Louise, who treated him adoringly like a younger brother even though Phil was three months older than her. Chris brought out the snarky side of Phil, evoking Phil to unintentionally spill dirty innuendos and double-entendres at the most unexpected moments. PJ and Phil quickly grew close with each other as well. They both had similar high levels of creativity, had the most similar senses of humour, and scarily had extremely matching personalities. They both blended and worked so well together that someone might assume that they were brothers.

However, Phil and I were glued to the hip. We became so attached to each other that we didn't even go to any social events without the other's presence. I guess the main reason Phil was closer to me than anyone else was because I got to spend time with him daily in the forest.

Although Chris was the comedian in our group, and PJ had the same sense of humour as Phil, I felt exceedingly proud that _I_ was the only one who could make Phil laugh until he had tears dripping down his eyes. His cheeks would glow with an unmistakable red bloom and his grin would stretch from ear to ear. It was a laughter that Phil could feel in his lungs, so hard that it took his breath away.

The lack of oxygen didn't matter when uncontrollable laughter and happiness overtook us.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! New update on Thursday.


	4. Chapter 4

I exploded.  Again.

I ran out of my house, ignoring my mother’s calls of my name.  My legs sprinted as fast as they could, as if trying to get the overwhelming frustration building up inside of me to sprint out of my body.

What a familiar occurrence.  You would think that after frequently reaching my stress limit that I would be used to these recurring frustrations.

This time, tears were welling up in my eyes, causing the world around me to blur.  I refused to let them fall.  I blindly ran to the area where I could block out the world.  Where I didn’t have to juggle one lesson after another, where I didn’t have instructors yelling at me for my insignificant mistakes, where I didn’t revise my arse off for exams and still come out of the classrooms feeling unsatisfied and even _more_ stressed for my scores.

I stumbled into the familiar area and noticed it was empty.  Good, Phil wasn’t here yet.  I couldn’t show him my face like this.  I hated when people saw me cry, my tears always drowning me in sorrow causing other people to swim around me uncomfortably and hesitantly offer me pity.  Pity.  That was the worst thing I could receive in any situation.

I couldn’t keep them in anymore.  Warm droplets trickled down my cheek, trailing down my face until they loosely hung from my chin before plopping onto the grass.  I never learned how to cry with elegance, where one would stand silently while watching the shining droplets slowly fall from their wide, clear eyes.  My eyes get bloodshot when I cry.  My tears left watery streaks imprinted on my cheeks.  My face would sport a blotchy, wild red that would look as if I was having an allergic reaction.  My nose went runny and my throat released hideous sounds that were completely out of my control.  It was truly an ugly state that was only reserved for me.  No one needed to see me like this.

It was a wishful thinking, because sooner or later someone would be bound to see me like this.  Like today.

Once I started crying, I couldn’t close the flood gates even if I wanted to.  I rubbed my eyes and wiped my wet cheeks before fresh tears soaked the newly dried area again.

“Dan?”

My body froze, the tears actually pausing their flow as well.  My tear-stricken face slowly turned to the source of the voice.  And of course my vision was met with a familiar black-haired boy.

Phil took a small step towards me, and I looked away from him.  “Leave me alone, Phil,” I whispered hoarsely.

“Why are you crying?” he asked softly.

The tears resumed its flow.  “I want to quit,” I sobbed thoughtlessly.  “But I placed second in the 100-meter backstroke in yesterday’s swim race!  When I sang at the singing competition last week, the judges gave me a ‘Superior’ rating!  I played a very difficult classical piano piece at the talent show almost flawlessly!  The kids I’ve been tutoring are improving so much at school!  And I don’t know what to _do_!”  Now I _really_ couldn’t stop my eyes from crying.

I felt a hand softly squeeze my shoulder.  “What’s the point of improving in your lessons if you just want to quit?”

“I don’t want people to think I quit because I was shit!”  I cried angrily, jerkily shrugging his hand away.

“Since you’re doing so well, isn’t now the perfect time to stop?”

“When I improve, I want to keep going!”

“Haven’t you ever heard of the expression ‘digging one’s own grave’?”

I wanted to blow my fury and emotions at someone.  I spun around and faced Phil with tears still trailing down my cheek.  I pointed my finger at him accusingly.  “Stop using big phrases at me!  That’s absolutely useless!” I screamed hysterically.  “And leave me alone!  You don’t know how I feel, and I need to deal with this alone!”

“Dan,” Phil said calmly in the midst of my screaming.

“And who do you think you are anyways?  Acting like a kid one minute…”

“ _Dan,_ ” he repeated, obviously trying to get me to stop blabbering.  But I wasn’t done.  I needed to fume and vent.

“…and acting like an adult the next!  You’re so weird.  Sometimes you look like all the life is drained out of you…”

“ _Dan!_ ”

“…and then you look as happy as can be the next day!  Why can’t you just – _mmph!”_

Suddenly there was a pressure against my lips that forced me to stop talking.  I froze, causing every one of my thoughts and feelings and movements to freeze up as well.  I couldn’t think about anything other than what was happening.  My frantic worries and stress for my academics immediately dissipated as another kind of frantic worry surfaced.

Phil.  I stared at him with eyes wide like saucers, threatening to leap out of my sockets.  I could make out every little detail of his face at this proximity.  His smooth pale skin that existed unfairly without blemishes, his eyes closed and relaxed, his eyelashes dark and fluttering against his cheeks, his eyebrows perfectly arched and almost feminine-like.

And his lips.  They were completely against mine.  They weren’t moving, only applying pressure against my lips to keep me from talking.  But it didn’t matter if his lips were moving or not.  It didn’t change the fact that they were still against mine.

Phil was kissing me.

Phil was _kissing me._ My frozen mind thawed as my face heated up.  When I got my senses back and processed what was happening, I yelped against his lips and leaped back from him, my hands flying to cover my mouth as I stared at him flabbergasted and wide-eyed.

This _boy_ literally just had his lips on mine, yet he was standing there calmly with a small smile on his stupid face.  This _motherfucker._ In the two months that I’ve gotten to know Phil, I realised that he was the kind of person who constantly offered happy-go-lucky hugs and cuddles and embraces at any given moment.  Although I didn’t mind his frequent physical embraces, I was never someone who had the constant need to hug people.  But I could deal with Phil’s random hugs.  I was okay with that.

But I couldn’t deal with the possibility that Phil’s hug could turn into friendly kisses.

I opened my mouth to yell at him, because I was _not_ in the mood to be patient with him today.  Especially not after _that_.

“ _What the f_ – _!_ ”

“Didn’t think anything I could say would get through to you and calm you down,” he cut me off gently.  “So that was a little charm to cheer you up.  The boy who lived next door to me in New York taught it to me.”

My jaw dropped.  _That_ was his reasoning?  “ _Phil!”_ I shouted.  “You can’t just…just _kiss_ people when they’re sad!  That’s not normal!”

“And who’s the person that decides what is and isn’t normal?”  Phil argued, although his voice lacked venom or malice.

I threw my hands up in the air in exasperation.  “You are _literally_ ,” I slowly seethed at him, “the _weirdest_ kid I know.  Don’t kiss me ever again!  God, I can’t believe you kissed me to calm me down!”

He giggled.  He fucking _giggled_.  How was he treating an intimate act with such untroubled calmness and nonchalance?  Was kissing boys a normalcy to him?

“Fine, I won’t do that again.  But look, it worked.  You’re not sad anymore!”  Phil pointed out brightly.

I glared at him, but I couldn’t hold that anger in for long.  This was Phil, and I would give a standing ovation to anyone who could actually stay mad at him for a long period of time.  His polite and caring traits mixed so well with his bright and humorous side, allowing anyone who met him to take an immediate liking to him.  He also had the natural ability to cheer anyone up and brighten their days, and to my surprise even _I_ was starting to feel better just by being in his presence.

And his stupid _technique_ shocked me out of my sadness and stress, as I quickly noticed that I had stopped crying.  I just stared at him, my wrath dissipating into only a mere annoyance, and huffed out a slightly irritated sigh.  “Why do I hang out with you?” I asked him glumly.  “You’re terrible.”

He grinned happily, taking my half-hearted insults as compliments.  However, his smile slowly faded as a serious look passed his face.  He took a few step towards me, and instinctively I took a few steps back.  I gulped when my back hit a tree and I found Phil right in front of me.  I really hoped he wasn’t going to kiss me again.

“In all seriousness, Dan, stressing yourself out isn’t good for you,” Phil said solemnly.  “You don’t have to prove to anyone anything by juggling all these lessons, because you’re already amazing at everything you do.  Anyone can see that.  So maybe, you could try to find some alternatives.  Maybe you could quit voice lessons and take choir as a club at school?  Just…don’t stress yourself out when you’re going to break down like this in the end.”

I reluctantly nodded.  He took that as an approval to keep going.  “Maybe you could try new things too?  Things that you actually enjoy.  Because it doesn’t sound like you actually enjoy tutoring or singing lessons or piano recitals.  Maybe some things with a group, or with a friend.”  He lifted one shoulder.  “I’m always here if you want to take up pottery lessons or something and you want a friend to be there with you.”

I snorted.  “Pottery lessons?”  He smiled lightly, though he seemed to be patiently waiting for a real answer to his statement.  I sighed.  “You’re right.  I’ll think about it.”  He nodded encouragingly.  I started running through possibilities of some alternatives like he said, but I quickly decided that I needed a break from all this.  I needed to stop thinking about lessons and just…relax.

I wiped away the tears that were still lingering on my face.  I had never calmed down this quickly after crying with that level of intensity before.  Phil must be a wizard.

“Right now,” I sat down on the grass and reached up to tug Phil’s sleeve to come sit next to me, “let’s talk about something else.  Let’s do something else.  I want to get my mind off all of this right now.”

For the next two hours, I sprawled myself like a starfish on the dying grass while Phil sat against a tree.  Phil and I were in our own little worlds, with me calming down and pushing thoughts about academics and lessons away in lieu of fictional universes, and Phil writing in his notebook.  Though we didn’t stay in the hideout together in silence, as we frequently popped each other’s imaginative bubbles by jokes and sarcastic remarks and content laughter.  We almost forgot about my mental breakdown earlier.

I didn’t bring any homework in the rush of bolting out of my house earlier.  So sometimes, we were silent and my imagination would be stubborn and wouldn’t transport me to a mystical world and I wouldn’t have anything else to do.  Like right now.  I unconsciously shifted my gaze from the sky and looked at the boy sat a couple feet away from me.

I watched him scribble in his notebook, an act I saw him doing often.  His face was relaxed and content as he continued to write in his notebook.  It hit me that for the two months I’ve known him, I never knew what he actually wrote about.

“Hey, Phil?”

He glanced up at me.  “Yeah?”

“What are you always writing?”

“Words.”

I groaned.  “That’s not what I meant –”

“Philip!”

I jolted up at the unfamiliar voice booming through the forest.  I crawled to the nearby bushes to peek at whoever was walking through here.  Never in the six years that I’d known this forest had anyone else been here besides me and, as of recent times, Phil.

Suddenly someone tackled me from behind, and we both fell flat on the grass.  I cried out loudly in surprise, but it got muffled by a hand slapping over my mouth.  “Shh!”  Phil whispered to me.  I irritably smacked his hand away.

“What are you doing?”  I whispered back harshly.  “He’s calling your name!”

He shifted so he wasn’t lying right on top of me.  He kept an arm wrapped around my waist to restrain me from getting up.  He put a finger to his lips to warn me to shut up.

“Philip!”  The voice moved closer to us, and I felt Phil’s arm tighten around my waist.  He buried his head into my shoulder as the voice got louder and continued to repeat his name.  “Oh this is quite a problem.  Where has he gone off to this time?”

When the man’s footsteps faded away, Phil and I were still lying on our stomachs on the ground, unmoving.  Phil’s arm was still tightly clutching onto me, his head still buried in my shoulder.  I huffed out a small grunt and started to turn around in his grasp to face him, yet his arm still refused to release me.  When I had completely turned around on the grass, I tried to suppress the blush threatening to conquer my face as I realised how close I was to Phil’s face, our foreheads practically touching, and how he was practically lying on top of me.  “Phil,” I complained softly.  “Let go of me.”

Phil finally seemed to realise that the man had left and that he had no purpose to continue holding onto me.  When he let go of me, I sat up and stared at him questioningly as he tried to peek behind my head to verify the man’s departure.  When his eyes finally shifted to meet mine, his cheeks coloured slightly.  “I’m sorry about that,” he eventually muttered.  He shuffled to lean back against the tree again, avoiding my eyes as he opened up his notebook and started writing again.

My eyes widened incredulously.  Did he expect me to just sit there and not question what just happened, that a man was in this bloody forest looking for Phil?  “Phil,” I started to say.  His pencil briefly stopped writing, but he didn’t look up.  “Phil, who was that man?  How did he know that you’re here in the first place?”

He stayed silent, and I waited for him to answer.  He was playing with the corners of his notebook while probably thinking about what to say to me.  When he finally lifted his head, it didn’t go unnoticed by me of the expressionless look lingering on his face, a look that I haven’t seen in two months.  His shoulders sagged and he leaned his head back against the tree, avoiding my eyes and absently looking up at the sky.  “He’s my butler.  He knows I’m here because… my family owns this forest.  We live here.”

The slow person that I was, I thought he meant that he literally lived in the forest, like Tarzan.  My momentary confusion passed as realisation started to dawn.  There was a mansion at the other end of this forest, and whoever lived there received the forest as part of the property.

But that mansion was enormous.  So massive that it was almost an insult for labelling the building as a mansion.  It was a fucking palace.  Surely if Phil lived in this enormous, beautiful _palace_ , he wouldn’t be coming to the forest every day?

I opened my mouth to question him, but paused when I took in Phil’s face.  It was worse than expressionless, as a sliver of sadness drifted across his face.  His fringe fell over his downcast eyes and he didn’t bother pushing it off.  I snapped my mouth shut.  I decided to bring up this conversation another time and to not push it now.

The sun started to dip, preparing to sink behind the horizon.  I watched the prim shower of colours battling to dominate the sky, until orange finally conquered and speckles of pinks and purples and blues bravely emerged.  I glanced over at Phil, almost stunned that he was choosing to write in his notebook rather than viewing the scene above us.

Eventually the familiar darkness absorbed the brilliant colours and took over the sky.  I slowly got up on my feet.  “Crap, if I don’t go home soon, I’m gonna get yelled at.  See you later?”

I turned around to go home, expecting the familiar goodbye from him before I disappeared into the trees.  When I didn’t hear anything from Phil, I stopped and turned around.  He was still sitting there, not looking like he was preparing to head off home.  It hit me that for the time that we’ve been in this area together, I have never seen him leave to go home.

“You should go home too,” I suggested.  “It’s getting dark.”

“I don’t want to.”

I raised an eyebrow.  He had been resolutely consumed on writing silently since his butler – God, I can’t believe he had a _butler_ – had come to find him.  And now he looked so empty, so void of the bright liveliness that usually occupied his face.  It was quite unnerving seeing him like this.  But I wasn’t going to force him to tell me anything he didn’t feel comfortable with, and I definitely wasn’t going to force him to go home if he didn’t want to for his own personal reasons.  But I wasn’t letting him stay out here by himself in the dark.

“Do you wanna stay at my place, then?” I asked gently.

He seemed to perk up at that.  His pencil stopped its movement and he looked at me shyly, though his eyes appeared hopeful.  “I can do that?” he asked quietly.  “I wouldn’t be intruding on your family?”

I shook my head and smiled at him lightly.  “Of course not.  I wouldn’t ask if it was going to be a bother.”

He smiled back and got up, still clutching his notebook in one of his hands, and reached over to hug me, his arms enveloping me with warmth.  “Thank you, Dan.”

I hugged him back gently.  “It’s no problem.  A sleepover sounds like fun anyways.”

I felt him nod, and then he pulled back from me, a wide grin on his face.  I sighed quietly in relief when I saw the familiar happy Phil in front of me.

As we walked to my home, I hadn’t realised how cold it was until now, and how stupid I had been to run out of my house without a proper jacket or gloves in the middle of December.  Shivering, I rubbed my hands together to warm them up, but failed miserably.

“Ugh, it’s so cold,” I complained.  “I wish I had brought my gloves.”

Phil turned to look at me huffing air into my hands in the attempts to heat them up.  He took off his right glove and held it out to me.  “Do you want it?”

I nodded immediately and took the glove from him and put it on my right hand.  “My left hand’s still freezing, though.”

I thought he’d give me a sarcastic answer and roll his eyes and say something along the lines of “ _Deal with it_ ”.  Instead, he smiled and murmured, “Here, let me…” and reached out to put his hand into my unclothed one.  His hand was warm in mine, warmer than his glove was on my other hand.  But this felt a little awkward and uncomfortable.  My cheeks flared up.

“Phil…” I started.

“Yeah?”

“Isn’t this a bit weird, holding hands?”

He shrugged.  “Not really.  It’s just holding hands.” He glanced over at me, taking in my flustered face.  “And it’s dark out and no one’s here.”  He paused, biting his bottom lip before asking, “You’re not cold anymore, are you?”

“N-no, I’m fine.”  _Suck it up, Dan,_ I told myself.  _He kissed you today.  Surely you can handle holding hands.  Everything he does, however weird they are, is for you to feel better_.

Yet I couldn’t conceal the blush that lingered on my cheeks as we walked to my house together.  My mind was trying to push away the memory of Phil’s lips on mine as well, because the memory wasn’t helping with the redness on my cheeks.  I still couldn’t believe that he did that in attempts to calm me down.  I couldn’t believe that another boy had apparently kissed Phil and claimed that it was some “cheering up charm”.

When we reached my house, I held the door open for Phil and walked in behind him.  “Mum, I’m home!”  I called into the house.  I gently grabbed Phil’s wrist and pulled him towards the kitchen with me.  “I brought Phil over.  Is it okay if he stays over tonight?”

My mother, who was wearing a red and white checkered apron and had flushed cheeks from the heated steam blowing in her face from the boiling pot over the oven, turned and offered a wide smile at Phil.  She had only met Phil three weeks ago when he came over for video games and had already loved the boy.

“Of course, if Phil’s parents are okay with it?”

Phil nodded.  “I haven’t called them yet, but I’m sure they’ll be fine with it, Mrs. Howell.”

She walked over to us and lightly pinched Phil’s cheek like the embarrassing mother she was.  She looked at me and said, “Why don’t you take Phil upstairs and get him comfortable while I call his parents?”

 - x -

 

I was brushing my teeth in my parent’s bathroom while my mother was sorting out clothes in her room.  We were waiting for Phil to change into a pair of my pyjamas in my own bedroom.

When quiet knocks vibrated through the door, my mum let Phil into her room.  “Thank you for letting me use the shower earlier,” he told Mum.

She smiled.  “Oh, wonderful!  It looks like Dan’s pyjamas were just the right size.”

He nodded.  “Dinner was also amazing.  Thank you for everything, Mrs. Howell,” he thanked her again, a bashful smile lingering on his face.  Then he turned to look at me brushing my teeth in the opened bathroom.  “I’ll be in your room when you’re done.”  He politely gave Mum a final “goodnight” and turned to return to my room.

“Goodnight, dear,” she replied as we watched him leave.  As soon as the door closed behind him, my mother had a scarily huge grin planted on her face.  “Dan, take a picture with me and Phil tomorrow!”

I spat out my toothpaste into the sink and faced my mum, unimpressed. “What?  Why?”

“He’s so adorable!” my mother squealed, pressing her hands on either side of her cheeks.  I gaped at her as she acted like an adoring schoolgirl.  “I think I just saw little angel wings on his back!”  What the hell, she was _way_ too old to be acting like this!

“How about you get your head checked tomorrow?”  She entered the bathroom to pull my ear forcefully at my snarky response.

“He’s such a good boy,” she sighed fondly, her excitement calming down as a sad smile flickered on her face.  “You be good friends with him, alright?”

I nodded slowly.  “I will, mum,” I answered, not quite understanding her change in expression.  She pecked my cheek while I murmured a goodnight, and she headed back to her room.

I left the bathroom shortly after and found Phil lying in my bed and reading one of my books he got from my library.  He looked up from the novel as I crawled into bed next to him.  “Do you wanna play video games?”  I asked him.  He nodded, moving to place the book on the nearby table.

We spent the next two hours playing Sonic, cheering when we succeeded in a level and screaming and raging and playfully hitting each other when we failed.  When I tried to play the “Impending Doom” level, Phil – being the little shit that he was – kept trying to distract me with the most stupid comments.  “You know that stupid Pokémon that looks like a gear?”  He asked right before my concentration wavered and I fell into an abyss and lost a life. 

“Shut up!” I yelled, putting my hand on his face and forcefully tilting his head back.

He giggled, unfazed by my temper.  “It’s like a gear…”

“Shut _up_!”

“…that evolves into another gear…”

“Oh my _god_ ,” I groaned.

“…and then its final evolution is like three gears.”

“I’m going to rip your face off…”

“Guh-gear.  G-g-g-gear.”

I tackled him, causing him to fall back onto the bed and pulling me down with him.  “Literally shut up!  If you talk and I die again…” I tried to threaten, but was failing to hold back laughter, “I will literally punch you in the head.”

He continued to giggle while squirming under me.  “Dan…” he finally whined.  He pushed at my shoulders while I gripped onto his, us wrestling on the bed and almost at the verge of falling off of it.  “Let go of me…”

I stuck my tongue out at him childishly.  He groaned irritatingly and wrapped his legs around my waist.  “What the hell are you doing – _ah!_ ” I shrieked as he used all of his upper body strength to roll us around so that he was on top of me while I was trapped underneath him.  “What!  Rude!”  I huffed, struggling to get out of this position while he just sat there lazily on my hips while pinning down my shoulders like I had done to him.

He rolled his eyes.  “Oh, now _I’m_ being rude?  _You_ were the one who attacked me!”

“You deserved it!  You kept messing me up.”

“Stop blaming me for being rubbish.”

I slapped his shoulders.  “You’re a little shit, you know that?” 

“You’ve told me that like ten billion times tonight.”

“Ten billion and one times as of now, then.”

He laughed, warm and hearty, his eyes shining brightly and his teeth flashing brilliantly.  His laugh could light up a whole goddamn city, I swear.  I relaxed as I watched him laugh above me, a smile growing on my own face as well.  “You’re really lame, Dan,” he chuckled when his laughter died down.

“Yet you still laugh at all of my ‘lame’ jokes,” I countered.  “That means you’re just as lame as I am.”

He grinned.  He looked down at me and his eyes travelled to my hair, it being curly from the shower I took when we got home.  Reaching down to pull at a curl, he distractedly remarked, “I didn’t know you had curly hair.”

I let him continue to play with my hair – it admittedly felt quite nice and relaxing.  I closed my eyes and murmured, “That’s because I always straighten it so I don’t look like a fucking hobbit.”

I heard him giggle.  “You _do_ look like a hobbit, now that you mentioned it.”

I let out a groan. “Hell, I _know_.”  I shifted underneath him uncomfortably and complained, “Get off me, Phil.”

He chuckled as he finally obliged, the weight on my hips disappearing before he plopped onto bed next to me.

I sat up and leaned over Phil for the television remote on the bedside table next to him, and turned off the TV and the PlayStation system without bothering to take the video game disc out.  I got up anyways and told Phil, “I’m getting a cup of water, do you want anything to drink?”

“No, thanks.  I’m fine,” his muffled voice answered, and I glanced back to find him snuggling into the blankets with his face buried into the pillows.  I smiled fondly and left to go to the kitchen.

As it was an hour past midnight, I thought my parents had gone to bed by now.  Instead, as I approached the kitchen, I heard their soft voices speaking.

“…and when I had called the Lesters,” I heard my mum say, “it was their butler who answered me.  I had asked to talk to Phil’s mother, who was apparently home, but the butler told me she was in the middle of a very important research project and was too busy at the moment.”  There was a pause, then Mum continued.  “Shouldn’t it be a mother’s job to take a couple minutes to know the whereabouts of her son?  And apparently Phil’s father is rarely home at all.”

“Now, Anne.  Don’t pry into other families’ business,” my father cautioned.

“I’m just worried.  Phil is a very good boy as well.  I don’t want anything bad happening to him…”

Completely forgetting about getting a cup of water, I turned around to return to my room.  Were Phil’s parents indifferent to Phil?  Was that why he didn’t want to go home tonight?  If that were the case, putting up with indifferent parents definitely must be hard to deal with.

I walked into my room and crawled beneath the blankets next to Phil, who opened his eyes to look at me.  “Hey, Phil?”

“Mhmm?”

“You know, if… if there’s anything that’s ever on your mind that bothers you, you can talk to me about it, okay?”  I tentatively informed him.

He blinked, clearly confused.  “Not that I don’t appreciate that, Dan,” he slowly started.  “But what’s that about, all of a sudden?”

“It’s just that…” I didn’t divulge the information I overheard my parents talking about.  What if their worries and assumptions were wrong?  “It’s just that, you’ve seen me cry today,” I finally chose to say.  “And you made me feel better.  I just want to tell you that… if something’s bothering you, you can come to me about it too.”

He studied me for a moment, causing my cheeks to flush under his scrutiny.  I couldn’t decipher the emotions dancing behind his eyes.  He eventually accepted my suggestion and slowly nodded.  He reached out towards me and played with my hair again, slightly twirling a curl in his finger.  “Thanks, Dan,” he replied, smiling.

“Hmm,” I hummed, closing my eyes as he played with my hair.  “My hair has feelings, you know,” I murmured, seeking to steer the conversation into a lighter topic.  “It’s not something you can just twist and turn and play with.”

He snorted disbelievingly.  “Then what’s your excuse for heating the crap out of your hair to straighten it if it has feelings?”

“Sometimes, you need to make sacrifices for beauty,” I mockingly quoted a ridiculous beauty advert that was constantly played on TV.  “So that includes pushing my hair’s feelings aside for a greater cause.”

He didn’t say anything as he ignored me by deciding to run his entire hand through my hair.  I sighed softly as his fingers continued to gently rake through my curls, and shivered when his hand lightly grazed the back of my neck before burying it back into my hair.  He eventually said, “You don’t need to straighten it.”

“Yes, I do.  I look absolutely terrible otherwise.”

“No, you don’t.  Not really,” he murmured, absentmindedly twisting a curl in his finger.

I raised an eyebrow.  “You literally agreed like ten minutes ago that I looked like a hobbit.”

“Who says that’s a bad thing?”

I groaned and smacked his face with a pillow, causing him to yelp loudly and let go of my hair.  “If you’re trying to convince me to quit straightening my hair, it’s not working!”

“I’ll burn your straighteners then!”  He exclaimed giddily while he reached to stroke my head again.  I slapped his hand away.

“Christ, it’s like you’re obsessed with my hair now,” I grumbled.  He blushed slightly as he raised his hands in front of his chest as a sign of surrender.

“I’m sorry!  I just haven’t seen it like this before.  It’s fun to play with.”

“I’ll drop you off at PJ’s place if you need curly hair to play with.”

“You should’ve left it curly at his birthday party last week!  You two would have been matching.”

I scrunched up my face in disgust.  “That’s literally the worst idea ever.  It was bad enough that you shoved cake all over my face and I had blue icing on my nose for like two hours while nobody pointed it out to me.”

He snickered, and reached out to tap my nose lightly, causing me to blink rapidly in surprise at the unexpected touch.  “Why can’t you stop touching me today?” I muttered.

He shrugged, looking a little sheepish.  “I’m comfortable around you, so I’m just doing whatever’s coming naturally to me.”

“I hope the instinct to kill me in my sleep isn’t the next thing that comes ‘naturally’ to you.”

 We forgot about time as we spent the early hours together with teasing banter and overly sarcastic comments, finding ourselves using most of our energies on excessive laughter.  It was when sleep finally attacked our minds and caused the first yawns of the night to escape that we decided to shut our mouths and eyes.

“Hey, Phil?” I mumbled sleepily.

“Yeah?”

“Stop being so much fun.  It’s not good for my sleep cycle.”

Soft chuckles filled the room, followed by a quiet “Goodnight, Dan”.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The amount of times I had to write and rewrite this chapter is unbelievable. xD

Bright rays of sunlight seeped through the window, bathing my skin with warmth and providing a golden sheen of light to illuminate my room, but that wasn't what stirred me from my sleep. Instead, what truly shook away my sleepiness was the feeling of arms tightly wrapped around my waist, and legs entangled with mine. A boy with black hair had his head buried under my chin and was exhaling steady breaths that were warming up my neck.

I tried to unhook his arms and move away without waking him up, but as soon as I somewhat loosened his hold on me, he groaned softly, tightened his grip and pulled me closer to him, nuzzling his face further into me, which caused me to release a shaky breath. I could feel his chest rhythmically rising and falling against my chest, his parted lips lightly brushing against my neck, his warm breaths inhaling and exhaling on my skin.

I knew that I couldn't move away and get up without waking Phil up first. I slightly shifted away from him, the extra distance allowing me to see his face. And shit, I _really_ didn't want to wake him up. He looked so calm and content and relaxed, with his dark eyelashes brushing against his glowing pink cheeks, his rosy lips parted to let little huffs of breath out, his skin smooth and lacking any crinkles or blemishes, his ruffled black hair unevenly falling across his forehead.

Mum was right. He looked like an angel.

Hell, he was even _glowing_ , an effect created by the sunlight bouncing off of him.

I didn't know how long I was creepily watching him while he slept. Just watching Phil's relaxed face made my own mind relaxed and lazy, making me oblivious to the amount of time passing.

When Phil finally started stirring, my eyes quickly flew shut and I tried to steady my breaths to make it seem like I was still sleeping. He didn't need to know that I was watching him sleep like a creep while waiting for him to wake up so I could get out of his goddamn grip.

I felt him shifting against me, and then suddenly his hold on me vanished. I heard small groans and little cracking noises, probably from stretching. I continued pretending to sleep, waiting for him to go to the toilets or something before I could properly "wake up".

However, he didn't get off the bed. "Dan?" his voice whispered softly. I stirred, pretending that his whisper was what was waking me up.

"Hmm?"

"Are you awake?"

If my eyes were opened, I would have rolled them right now. "No, Phil," I mumbled, getting comfortable again and snuggling deeper into the bed. "I'm asleep. Stop interrupting my dreams."

" _Dan_ ," he tried again. "It's half twelve."

Forgetting about my plan to pretend to wake up after Phil, my eyes flew wide open and I stared at Phil, whose face was right in front of mine this time instead of underneath my chin. "It's half _twelve_?!" I exclaimed incredulously.

He nodded and sat up, then his hand scratched the back of his neck in embarrassment. I propped myself on one elbow and reached for my phone, groaning when I saw the time on it: 12:33 p.m.

"Shit, Phil, I blame you for this," I murmured half-heartedly. "If you didn't keep us up all night..."

He rolled his eyes. "Dan, shut it. It's your fault too." He moved to get up to use the bathroom, leaving me to have the room to myself.

I sighed and left to use another toilet in the house. When I was cleaned up and had my teeth brushed and had hair looking less like a bird's nest, I went to meet Phil in the kitchen.

Sundays were days when my parents got to stay home from work, and they usually read newspapers or filled out paperwork together on the kitchen table. I really shouldn't have expected today to be an exception to their routine.

As Phil and I walked into the kitchen, my parents' eyes snapped up from their paperwork to us. "It's about time you two woke up!" my mother exclaimed as my father chuckled and shook his head. "It's almost one in the afternoon!"

"When did you two fall asleep?" my father asked. My mother rose to warm up our food.

Phil and I exchanged sheepish looks. "Really late..." I muttered while Phil stared at the floor, not meeting my parents' eyes.

My parents noticed Phil averting his gaze, and their own eyes softened. "Phil, honey, we're not mad," my mother told him fondly. "It's alright, we're just teasing you two. As long as you are well rested, it _is_ the weekend. But now," she gave us two plates of pancakes and beamed at us, "Eat up! Though I should be giving you two lunch now, honestly."

My parents went to the lounge so that Phil and I could have brunch at the kitchen table. We ate in content silence for a while, until I decided to toss a piece of pancake at his face, causing him to blink quickly in surprise at the thrown food. He reached out to pinch my arm, making me hiss. "Let me eat in peace!" He whispered, pouting his lips slightly.

"I'm still blaming you for getting us to fall asleep at five in the morning!" I accused lamely.

"I'm sorry for being 'so much fun,'" he teased, putting a piece of his pancake in his mouth while watching me with a glint of amusement in his eyes. I scowled.

"I never said that!"

"Yes, you did! Right before you fell asleep."

My faced heated up in embarrassment. "Did not!" I protested indignantly.

He stuck his tongue out at me. "Did too!"

I huffed in annoyance and got up to put my empty plate into the sink. "I'm leaving you. I'm heading up to my room."

"Fine, I'll enjoy my pancakes more now that you're going to be gone," he said with over exaggerated enthusiasm coating his voice.

I slapped his shoulders lightly as I walked past him and headed up to my room. Although I wasn't tired – and of course I wasn't, I slept past noon for god's sakes – I plopped back onto the bed and reached for my phone from the bedside table. However, my focus went to Phil's nearby black notebook instead.

I was always curious on what he was writing in there. I was sure it wasn't a notebook for homework, he seemed to write in it as a hobby. Was it a diary? A planner? Curiosity eclipsed the rational part of my brain that told me to not look at other people's things without their permission. I grasped the book to bring it to me and –

"Did you miss me? Your parents kept asking me how breakfast was." Phil suddenly burst into my room. I immediately dropped his notebook onto the table and swiftly drew my hand to my side, hoping that he didn't see me touch it. _If he asked, I'll just say that I was getting my phone_ , I thought nervously.

I tried to push the guilt aside as he got onto the bed and sat next to me. I didn't open up his notebook, so I shouldn't feel guilty, right? Nevertheless, I couldn't ignore the fact that I was about to pry into it without his permission.

I met his eyes, and nothing in his blues gave away any emotion related to catching me in the act. I gradually relaxed.

I tilted my head to the side and asked him, "What time do you need to return home?"

He shrugged. "I dunno, I think Mr. Alexander would've called or something if my parents wanted me home soon."

"Who's Mr. Alexander?"

"The...my butler."

I nudged his shoulders with my side gently and muttered, "I still can't _believe_ you have a butler."

He rolled his eyes. "And _I_ can't believe you have such nice parents," he replied, mocking my incredulous tone.

"My parents are embarrassing!" I complained. "They were young when they had me, and now they're always trying to act like the 'cool parents' as if they're my age, when they're obviously not. It's so cringe-worthy."

He chuckled at my complaints. "Hey, everyone wants to be young and fourteen forever..."

"Don't you even dare try to defend them," I warned him, crossing my arms over my chest.

He laughed cheerfully. "Well –"

" _Don't you even dare_. They're embarrassing. I shit you not, my _dad_ offered tampons to my ex-girlfriend one time, and we were both only thirteen and she wasn't even on... _that_! She was just moody and tired and cranky because she failed a maths test she revised hard for."

Phil's eyes widened and his hand flew to his mouth to cover his laugh. But his hand didn't reduce the volume of his laugh, because he was cracking up loudly. "That's gross, your dad did _not_ do that!" he exclaimed in horror.

"He did!" I insisted. "It was mortifying! Forget how _my_ face looked like that my _dad_ offered to get her tampons, Marissa looked like she wanted to curl up into a ball and cry."

" _I_ want to curl up into a ball and cry, and I wasn't even there!" Phil wheezed out, trying to catch his breath from laughing so hard.

"I cringe every time I think about that, oh my god." I shuddered. " _This_ is why girls don't like me. Because when I bring them home they meet my embarrassment of a family."

His chortles reduced to snickers. "Is _that_ your excuse for not having a girlfriend? Are you sure it's not because there's something wrong and off-putting about _you_?"

I rolled my eyes. "What could _possibly_ ," I started, my voice dripping in sarcasm and fake cockiness, "be wrong with _me_? I'm absolute perfection, am I right?"

"I didn't know perfect people dribbled in their sleep," he deadpanned.

My face heated up, mortified and embarrassed. "I don't dribble in my sleep!"

"If you say so," he sang in a patronising tone.

"Well, you're not any better! _I_ couldn't get up this morning because _someone_ had a death grip on me!" I blurted out, only realising what I had just said as soon as the words left my mouth. My cheeks were surely Crimson by now.

He had an embarrassed look crossing his face as well and scratched the back of his neck. "Yeah, about that. I should've told you that when I sleep –" he stopped talking as he furrowed his eyebrows. "Wait, how did you know? You weren't even awake when I woke up?"

"I woke up while you were sleeping and tried to move away," I admitted, looking away even though that wasn't hiding the embarrassment in my voice or its evidence on my cheeks. "But I couldn't move away, so I...I went back to sleep."

That last part was obviously a lie, but I wasn't going to say " _I was watching you sleep and waiting for you to wake up"._

He released an uneasy chuckle, then said, "Sorry about that. I should've warned you that I have to hold onto something when I sleep. Usually it's a pillow..."

I didn't want him to be uncomfortable, because Hell knew what _I_ did when I sleep. "It's fine. I'm like a starfish when I sleep. I'm surprised I didn't accidentally kick your face, to be honest." Memories of sleepovers with PJ and the others flooded my mind, the mornings always starting with them complaining about the fact that my leg was sprawled over their stomachs or that my arm was slapped across their faces.

I checked the time on my phone. 13:30. "Let's go out to the forest, okay?" I asked Phil.

\- x -

"You know," I broke the silence that was made by our concentration on homework. "You never really talk about _your_ family. But you know my family. You know how my parents are with their niceness and their creepiness."

He shifted uncomfortably on the grass and bit his lip, not glancing up from the workbook in front of him. "I mean, there's not much to talk about them. They're parents, and definitely not as...interesting as yours."

"Well, that's okay, they don't have to be interesting," I tried again. "I just...I just feel like I know so much about you, but I don't know anything about your family or your home or anything. Like, do you have any siblings? Any pets? Is your grandma a fortune teller?"

He giggled, but this time it was different. It was sort of stiff and forced. "Well, my grandma claims to be psychic, actually, so good guess. And as for siblings, I have one older brother named Martyn."

"Oh, really? What's he like?"

"He's...really fun, I guess. We get along well. He's really hard-working and motivated. Got into the university he wanted to, the degree that he wanted." He shrugged. "I just don't see him that often, since he's off at uni."

"That's cool. I always wanted a sibling," I sighed.

"I know loads of people who don't get along with their siblings. Though I've always gotten along with Martyn, so that's nice."

As we finished up on homework, Phil filled me in with stories about him and Martyn, ranging from when they were kids and stayed up late to watch horror movies together – which always gave Phil a shit-tonne of nightmares that night – to when Martyn lied to Phil by telling him that girls had "two willies".

"'And they move in different directions,' he told me!" Phil ranted, making me laugh at Phil's past gullible mind. "And I believed him! My grandma had to clear that up for me. Not by showing me! But by...telling me they don't have that."

I giggled. "Oh, _Phil._ I can't believe you believed that."

"How was I supposed to know? I trusted everything my brother said," he sighed. "I still do, to be honest. I miss him."

"Doesn't he come home from uni to visit sometimes?" I asked him.

He shrugged. He opened his mouth to say something, but whatever he was going to say was interrupted by a sudden clap of thunder crackling above us, causing us to flinch and jump up in surprise. Grey clouds were quickly overshadowing the previous clear blue sky. How the _fuck_ did I not notice the signs of an impending storm before now?

Suddenly, rain started pouring down in wild, heavy drops, the rapid gust of wind making them fall harshly in a diagonal manner. Water trickled down my face like tears, but unlike tears I wasn't in control of stopping these droplets. I looked over at Phil, and saw that he had drenched clothes and wet skin and droplets hanging from his eyelashes as well.

We hurried to pack up our books, ignoring how wet and soaked the papers had gotten. "I can't believe it's raining!" I shouted loudly as another thunderous boom roared. "It was sunny and fine literally three minutes ago!"

We hastily finished packing our books. Phil grabbed my free hand and pulled at it. "Come on, Dan! The rain's getting heavy! My house is closer!"

We sprinted together under the dark grey sky, with him pulling my hand and guiding me to his home. However, the rapid speed of our running didn't let us escape the harsh waters soaking our skin and clothes. By the time we got to his home's huge gates, we were thoroughly drenched.

He pushed the doors of his gates, and shit was it enormous – his gates must've been six meters tall. The distance from his gates to his house was incredibly large. _Everything_ here seemed incredibly large. His hand returned and clasped mine again, and we ran through the yard to his home.

And Christ, his home was absolutely _massive_. A bloody palace, that was what this was! But the astonished admiration about the size of the house quickly disappeared as the need to get into this home to escape the bleak weather appeared.

We burst through the mansion's doors, and _finally_ warmth and dry air enveloped us. We started shivering from the cold waters that stubbornly clung onto us.

"Mr. Alexander!" Phil suddenly shouted, his voice echoing through the empty entrance hall. "Can you please get two towels?"

Phil removed his shoes, motioning me to do the same as well. I took mine off, and hell, I felt dirty all of a sudden for putting wet, soggy shoes onto the pristine, spotless floor. I turned around and took in my surroundings. And my mind went blank as I stared at the room.

The entrance hall was bloody enormous, probably a good eleven meters from the floor to the ceiling, which held three exquisitely ornamented golden chandeliers. Sheer white and gold decorated every area, every crevice of this wide entrance hall. The tall white walls were occupied with beautifully intricate and curvy golden designs and patterns. The floor was glossy and shiny and so spotless that our reflections were visible on it. There were two large staircases on opposite sides of the hall, both curving upwards and leading to the same floor.

On one of the staircases, a tall man fitted in a black suit descended down its steps, his footsteps echoing through the hall. He had dark brown hair and a handsome face and a straight posture. Once he came down the steps, he walked towards us and offered the two towels that were sitting on his arms.

"Hello, Philip," the man greeted with a warm smile as Phil took a towel from him. "Who's this?"

"This is Dan," he replied while drying his hair with the towel. "I stayed over at his home last night."

"Hi," I said shyly, not knowing what else to do or say, and tentatively took the towel from the man.

The man smiled, crinkles forming around his eyes and lips. "Yes, that's right. Thank you for taking care of Philip yesterday. He's told me a great deal about you."

Hopefully they were good things. Nevertheless, I tried to politely respond, but instead awkwardly replied, "Oh, uh, thank you for the towels."

He chuckled lightly, thankfully choosing not to acknowledge my awkward manners. "Well, Dan. Welcome to our house. I'm James Alexander, the butler of the Lester family. I'll call your family to let them know you're here."

Phil grabbed my wrist and steered me towards one of the staircases. "We'll be in my room!" He told the man as we ascended up the stairs, the steps also clean and spotless and glossy enough for our reflections to show.

When we entered his room, I inhaled a sharp breath. It was very...Phil. The only things similar about this room to the rest of the house was the sheer enormity of the room and the chandelier that hung from the ceiling. His floor wore a teal-coloured carpet; his white walls were plastered with bright posters; his bedsheets were patchworked with blues and greens; his furniture were colourful plush beanbags, a black rolling chair for a black desk, a white drawer chest with a bunch of stuffed animals on it. And he had tall bookshelves as well as shelves for DVDs, TV shows, and CDs.

I whipped my head back to Phil. "Why didn't you tell me you were fucking loaded?" I demanded in astonishment. "Your house is literally a palace!"

" _I'm_ not the one who's rich, that's my parents," he replied calmly as he headed for his wardrobe.

"'My parents aren't interesting', my ass," I muttered as I followed him.

"They're really not, though. Now, do you want clothes or not?"

I sighed. "Yes, please." I turned to study his room more while he tried to find clothes for me. "Your room's really nice. Your whole house is really nice, actually. Why do you spend half the time with me in the forest when you've got a home like this?"

He held out a black jumper and pyjama pants for me. "Why do _you_ spend half your time in the forest when you've got a nice place and nice parents?"

I took the clothes from him. "I told you, my parents are embarrassing. I love them to death, but I am _not_ spending all my time with them."

He didn't respond immediately. He took off his soggy shirt, revealing his smooth pale torso, and tossed it into a laundry bin. "I get lonely," he finally replied. "There's only so much that video games or books can do for you. There's no one ever to talk to here except the butler and the maid. And my parents work late, so they're practically never home."

We both turned around to offer the other privacy as we stripped off our pants and boxers. Our pants had soaked so much water from the rain that it drenched through our underwear as well. When I was done and Phil informed me that he was too, we turned back around. He was wearing a bright green shirt accompanied with Cookie Monster pyjamas. He motioned me to follow him to his bed, and immediately snuggled into the sheets for warmth.

Right before I decided to crawl into bed next to him, there were three light taps on the door.

"Come in," Phil granted from under his covers.

Mr. Alexander walked in with two cups of tea. "Philip, your mother called from her office. She wishes to speak to you."

Phil's head poked out of the duvet. He sighed and got up, shoulders sagged and unhappy faced. "Sorry, I'll be back in a bit," he told me quietly. "Help yourself with a book or movie or anything."

"Okay." I nodded. I went to take the cup of tea that Mr. Alexander offered me, thanking him before he and Phil left the room.

The door closed behind them, and I was left alone in the room, staring at a poster of Matt Bellamy on the wall.

I looked around the room, searching for something to do. Of course, there were many options in his room that sparked my interest. Books, TV shows, anime, music – I knew that Phil and I had the same tastes in almost everything. But my eyes locked onto our backpacks at the corner of the room and lingered on the black notebook peeking out of his bag.

It was as if I was put under a spell. I was drawn to it. I walked towards it. I could practically feel Matt Bellamy's eyes burning holes into the back of my neck, judging me for this. I didn't know what exactly got me so fixated on Phil's notebook, but the desire to resolve my curiosity overcame me.

 _I'll just take a quick glance at it,_ I tried to convince myself and drive the arising guilt away. _And if it's a diary, I'll close it right away!_

I picked up the notebook, still wet and damp by the rain, and tentatively opened it up. I mindlessly made my way back to Phil's bed while reading the first page. And god, once I started reading, I couldn't put it down.

It wasn't a personal diary or a planner. No, it was a storybook. Phil was writing a story, a goddamn amazing, articulate, mind-gripping, well-written _story_. The idea of the story may have been simple – it was about a teenage boy and his journey through secondary school. But hell, the thoughts of the main character were so bloody intricate and interesting. "Fucking hell," I murmured my thoughts out loud in awe as my fingers flipped to the eighth page. "He should be a writer!"

Soon enough, my eyes were reading the twelfth page in interest, completely fascinated by the story as well as Phil's writing style. "'One good act deserves another in return,'" I read aloud and frowned. What did that mean?

Suddenly, the door swung wide opened. But I didn't turn around, too consumed on the story. "Dan, we have sweets and more tea downstairs if you want to –" A loud gasp disrupted Phil's sentence, followed by rapid footsteps approaching my way. "Who said you could look at that?!" he demanded, panic evident in his voice.

I glanced up when he was stood right in front of me, when he was reaching for the notebook in my hands. I angled my body away from him, blocking him from it as I asked, "Did you write this?"

Arms reached around me to grab the notebook, but to no avail as I kept shifting away from him. "Give it back!"

"Let me read this from the beginning! This is only the middle part of the story, isn't it?"

"I said give it back, Dan!"

"This is really interesting! Just let me read it a little more?"

He stopped struggling against me for his notebook as he clenched his fists to his sides and squeezed his eyes shut. " _Dan!_ "

My own eyes widened at his furious shriek and I spun to fully look at him. Complete guilt and shame washed over me. I couldn't believe I had done this, snooping and reading something that was so obviously personal to Phil, and then refusing to give it back to him immediately. Phil refused to meet my eyes, his own eyes downcast and his lips pursed and his hands clenched into fists so tight his knuckles had gone white.

"I'm sorry," I stammered, promptly returning the notebook back to Phil. "I'm so sorry, Phil. This was absolutely none of my business. Please don't hate me."

He took the notebook from my hands and placed it on his desk without a word. I bit my bottom lip as I apprehensively awaited his next move.

With his back turned to me, he started to speak again. "It's just that, this is personal to me, Dan," he murmured quietly. "It's kind of like a diary, but in the form of a story." He paused before raising his voice at me, sounding slightly irritated. "And Dan, you can't expect me to not be a little upset."

"I'm sorry," I whispered softly, flinching at his scolding tone. I didn't take into account that Phil would actually be _mad_ at me. That was an emotion I had never associated Phil with before.

I didn't know what else to say, so I stayed quiet while he gathered his thoughts. He slowly walked towards me and sat on the edge of the bed, fixing his gaze onto the tall bookshelves across the room. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to yell at you," he mumbled finally. "I just...I'm not in the best mood after I talk to my parents."

I bit my lip, trying to hold back the question, but excessive curiosity had always been one of my biggest flaws. "Why?"

He didn't respond. Instead, he shook his head, as if trying to shake away the question as well. When he started talking again, his previous frustrated tone was now cloaked with weary sadness. "And I don't need your pity, Dan. You don't have to lie to me and tell me it's interesting just to make me feel better. I know the story is pathetic."

My jaw dropped, and I just sat there gaping at him for a moment. Was that what he thought I was doing? "I wasn't pitying you!" I protested. "It's really interesting! And I've read two-thirds of the books in our school's library, so when I say that a story is good, I mean it!"

The corners of his lips twitched upwards briefly, but a frown immediately swallowed up that potential smile. "My parents think it's stupid to write stories," he muttered under his breath.

I raised my eyebrows. I almost blurted out something incredibly rude like " _who cares what your parents think, you're a great writer_ ", but I clamped my mouth shut right before those words spilled out. Instead, I asked him, "How come?"

He fiddled with the bedsheets and shrugged. "They think it's a distraction, a useless hobby that won't get me anywhere in life."

"But you're still a kid. You're fourteen, only turning fifteen next month. Isn't it the time for hobbies?"

He sighed, and I could hear the sadness and exhaustion within that exhaled breath. "I... don't want to talk about it," he muttered eventually. "Forget it, Dan, please."

I couldn't deal with Phil's puzzling thoughts anymore. I instantly forgot about my guilt at that moment as frustration rapidly seeped in, and threw my hands up in exasperation. "What the hell, Phil!" I shouted, causing Phil to flinch at my sudden loud volume. "I give up! If you don't want to talk about it, then don't mention it in the first place! You can't just give me these little encrypted messages and not expect me to question it!"

I didn't even notice Phil recoiling again at my aggravated tone. I continued to spit out my irritation. "Of course, you don't owe me anything. You don't have to tell me anything you don't want to. But I want to help you. But you can't just...can't just randomly bring up things like 'my parents hate what I love' and then just leave it there and leave me unnecessarily curious and confused. It's so _stupid._ And I feel so _useless_ when you do that!"

My heavy, frustrated pants filled the eerily silent room. When he started talking, his voice was awfully small and weak. "Are you...mad at me?" He seemed incredibly shaky as he waited for my response. He was biting his lip nervously and looking at me with wide eyes filled with worry and guilt. And similar to the short time it took for my irritation to ignite, the flame burned out just as quickly. Immediate regret scorched my previous frustration.

"Kind of," I started to say, but quickly changed my mind when his face fell and his eyes dropped its gaze to the floor. "Wait, no. No, it's okay, I'm not mad. I just don't know what's wrong with you. I mean, shit, that's not what I meant. I just...don't understand what's going on with you. I want to help, but I don't know how to if you don't let me in a little bit."

He didn't answer. He avoided my eyes and looked away, turning his back to me in the process. My eyes widened and I wanted to _slap_ myself. Why the actual fuck did I yell at him? He didn't owe me anything, he didn't need to tell me anything he didn't want to. But I had still yelled at him. And now, he had his back turned to me, denying me access to view his face. Now I couldn't observe the emotions on his face or find out what he was feeling as I stared at the back of his head.

"I'm sorry," I whispered. The emotions in my voice sounded raw, the guilt sticking out the most. I felt terrible, absolutely terrible, for making him feel bad. The actual embodiment of sunshine had his happiness dimmed because of _me_.

"Please don't be mad at me," he whispered almost inaudibly, his voice trembling. "Please."

The wobble in his words surprised me, and my heart started to ache. When I yelled at him, I hadn't realised what I said would have caused Phil to feel _this_ bad. I mustered the courage to shuffle over to him, then hesitated as I lifted my hand to rest on his shoulder. At the last second, I drew my hand back before it touched him. I wanted to comfort him, but I didn't know how. But I didn't want him like this, feeling so broken and guilty. He had no reason to feel guilty. That emotion should only be reserved for me right now.

"Phil," I croaked out. I finally threw my arms around him and gently pulled him into me, his back softly hitting my chest. He froze. I knew, I _knew_ from his rigid response, that I had messed up. That yelling at him had hit a sensitive nerve. He never said no to hugs. He was always quick to reciprocate.

I decided to ignore his stiff reaction, holding him firmly against me but still loose enough for him to easily get out of my embrace if he wanted to. I rested my forehead on the back of his head. "I'm not mad at you," I murmured into his hair, hoping my earnest sincerity could be heard through my soft voice. "I didn't mean to yell at you like that."

He didn't respond. He didn't relax his body either. I hesitated again, but braved myself to shift my head, letting it slowly travel to the side. My nose trailed along the side of his head, moving down along his neck and stopping right above his clavicle. He trembled a bit in the process. I turned my head to the side and buried my face into his neck. He was still holding his breath, not reacting at all.

"You're mad at me," I announced quietly, my lips accidentally grazing his neck. He shivered, releasing a small breath. "But I really am sorry. I didn't mean what I said."

I finally heard him sigh. It was like a sigh of defeat. "Stop apologising," he responded at last. "That's just making me feel worse."

I stopped nuzzling his neck. He didn't correct what I just suggested. Oh god, he really was angry with me. But I still didn't move away from him, clutching onto him as if touching him and hugging him would make him forgive me. I moved to rest my forehead on his shoulder instead, still not courageous enough to glance up and meet his eyes. "Then tell me what to do. I don't want you to be mad at me."

"I'm not mad at you." Those words reduced some of my worry, but I was still confused. Why did he still seem distant?

"Then tell me what you're feeling instead," I insisted.

"I was just...shocked. Surprised." He admitted. "Surprised, because I...I never thought _you_ would yell at me like that. I never thought _you_ would actually be that angry with me. I'm not mad about what you said. Just...surprised about how you said it. I don't like it when you're that cross with me, Dan."

My eyes softened. I finally summoned the bravery to look at him. I lightly held Phil's chin and turned his face to the side to look at me. Large pools of blue locked with my eyes. To say that his eyes were blue right now was like saying that blood was red: accurate but not sufficient enough to describe the exposed wounds. He looked absolutely vulnerable.

"I won't yell at you like that again," I promised. "You make it too hard for anyone to stay mad at you, anyways. I swear I felt bad immediately."

He closed his eyes and sighed. He leaned his face forwards and rested his forehead against mine. "You make it too easy to forgive you." His breath ghosted around my mouth.

We stayed in that position for a while, our foreheads against each other's and our warm breaths mingling together while I held him in my arms. I suddenly realised how quick I was to forgive him, already forgetting _why_ I had yelled at him in the first place. It dawned on me that I wasn't ever going to be able to hold a single negative feeling towards Phil, no matter how small or justified that emotion would be.

This boy was going to be the death of me.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AHHHH so I shit you not, this chapter was originally 12,000+ words, but I decided to split it into two chapters because why the hell not.  
> But thank you to everyone who has been reading this story so far! I feel like at this pace, this is going to be a hella long chaptered fic (probably over 80K-90K words omg). And thank you to Alex who has been beta-ing this fic. <3


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heads up: a bunch of unnecessary cuddling.

I was still holding onto Phil, with our foreheads resting together and our small breaths mingling together. After a while he started to shift against me. I loosened my grip on him, and he gently removed my arms and got out of my hold.

I watched him crawl under his duvet. “Phil?” I asked hesitantly. What had happened? Had I done something wrong?

His emerged from the covers and tilted his head, motioning me to the blankets. “Lie down with me, Dan?”

I nodded, exhaling a small, relieved breath. I followed him under the covers and laid down next to him. His face was right in front of mine, only a couple inches away. Even when cloaked with dim lighting, I could identify the bright colours of his eyes, the swirl of blue and green and yellow. Someone could get lost in that swirl.

We stayed quiet for a moment, just studying each other’s faces. Finally, he started talking again. “Can you hold me?” he pleaded. His eyes were large and his lips were pouting. He looked and sounded like a young child.

I hesitated, not understanding his request. I had already been holding him before he had moved away to hide under his blankets. “Why?”

His shoulders sagged a bit. “I feel like it would help. It could be better talking about my…personal things like that,” he muttered, looking away.

I bit my bottom lip, contemplating the situation. “Phil, you don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to,” I reassured. “Don’t feel pressured to. I was just being a nosy prick today.”

He shook his head adamantly. “But I _want_ to, Dan,” he insisted. “I feel like talking about it would make me…feel better. And you did ask about my family today. So I just thought…” He trailed off, not finishing his sentence. He chewed the inside of his cheek nervously. “But of course, you don’t have to listen to me if you don’t want to. I just thought that…you told me yesterday that if anything bothered me, I could tell you.” His voice was weak and shaky from hesitance.

I thought my regret had finally disappeared, but it stubbornly kept resurfacing. I heard Phil’s voice, nervous and uncertain and almost vulnerable, and I instantly tried to shove my own discomfort aside in order to comfort him. I _did_ tell him that yesterday, and I meant it. And here Phil was, one of my best friends, asking me to be a listening ear and offer him comfort, and here _I_ was, being a dick and shifting uneasily on the bed just because he wanted me to hug him.

I immediately opened up my arms. “Come here, Phil,” I whispered softly.

He hesitated for a moment, just like I had when he initially made this request. But soon he was shuffling towards me, timidly nuzzling my cheek with his nose before burying his head into my neck and wrapping his arms around my waist. I enveloped him with my arms again, one around his waist and a hand on the back of his head, and held him tightly against me. My head rested on top of his, damp brown curls mingling with straight black locks.

Our legs intertwined of their own accord, and soon enough Phil and I were tightly cocooned in each other’s arms, though I still didn’t understand what for. Phil shifted against me on the bed, trying to get comfortable.

He finally stopped moving and decided to rest his cheek on my shoulder, causing little puffs of breath to linger on my neck. I waited for him to start talking while I mindlessly played with strands of his hair, slightly weaving my fingers through them.

The room was eerily quiet, save for the soft pattering the rain was making against the window, so when Phil started talking – albeit quietly – I almost leapt out of my skin.

“I miss Martyn,” I heard him murmur. “But I’m glad that I met you, Dan. You make it so much easier.”

“What did I do?” I asked stupidly. I still didn’t understand what was going on.

“You make me happier,” he mumbled. “You make me feel like I’m not alone.”

I furrowed my eyebrows. “But you always seem happy, Phil.”

He shook his head. “I’m happy when I’m not in this house. I’m happy when I’m out of here. But you make me _happier_ , Dan. Because you’re like a brother to me. You’re incredibly nice and caring, you…took care of me yesterday, you make me laugh, you’re patient with me…” He stopped talking and glanced up at me when I released an awkward breathy laugh. My cheeks had flushed from his compliments, and he noticed. He poked my cheek with his cold finger and teasingly cooed, “Aw, you’re blushing.”

“Shut up,” I muttered, lightly smacking his hand away. “Also, I thought this conversation was going to be about you, not me.”

He sighed exasperatedly, poking my ribs hard and making me yelp in surprise. “I’m getting there, Dan,” he murmured. He didn’t say anything for a moment, and just when I was about to open my mouth to point that out, he heaved out another sigh and started talking again.

“Martyn is four years older than me. He always tried to take care of me when we were younger because our parents were never home. They were always busy with work, so they hired a nanny because they never had the time to take care of us themselves. We also had Mr. Alexander practically raising us since I was born. And I loved my nanny and I love Mr. Alexander, but as a child I preferred them over my actual parents because I never saw them.” He shrugged his shoulders. “And I guess, my parents also preferred something else over their own kids. They preferred work. And they would come home late at night or even only every few nights, but me and Martyn were always asleep by then. And the times they actually came home while we were awake, they tried to talk to us. But it was like they knew nothing about us personally. I mean, how could they? They never saw us. And we never saw them.”

He paused, allowing me to process the new information. I was confused and a little surprised. Even if his parents were busy, how did they not make some time for their kids? Surely his parents couldn’t have been so occupied with their jobs that it would hinder them from getting to know their children?

“But as we got older, the majority of the conversations between us and our parents turned into discussions about their business,” he continued. “They really did love their business. They still do. I don’t know how my parents can enjoy running investment bank companies – it sounds so _boring_ – but they do. They love it. More than they love us.”

“That’s not true,” I immediately argued. There was no way people could love working over their own children.

“It is, though,” he insisted, sadness trickling in his voice. I refused to believe him. I couldn’t imagine that situation, and it was nearly impossible to wrap my mind around it. But I’ve always had loving parents. I’ve never been in Phil’s position.

“And then, when I was ten, my parents announced that they needed to work overseas. I didn’t exactly know what that meant until we were packing our bags and booking one-way plane tickets to New York. And god, the change was overwhelming. I grew up in the northern part of England, Dan, and then suddenly we go to _New York._ First of all, Manhattan was just like what you see on TV: busy streets, a billion yellow taxis, skyscrapers and business companies filling any free area, bright and blinding colourful lights, people in intimidating business suits constantly rushing through the streets with a suitcase in one hand and shouting into a cell phone in the other.

“But even when I was flung into a completely new place, I had someone familiar with me: Martyn. We went through it together. And we slowly ended up loving New York – there were so many things to do, so many distractions that would take our minds off home.”

He stopped again, releasing a shaky breath and making the air ghost on my neck, before he continued.

“And then, when Martyn was in his last year in high school, he started to apply to universities. Then all of a sudden, my parents made the time to come home more often. They started to talk to him more, giving him a kind of attention that he had never received from them in any of his eighteen years. And it freaked him out. Then when he was filling out his uni applications, my parents made sure he was applying as a business major. See, they wanted Martyn to get his education in business and then take over the family business in the future. They actually started to talk to him, and not even about _him_ and how _he_ was doing, but only about their _damn_ _business_.”

I could feel Phil shaking in my arms, undoubtedly shaking with anger if the heated tone in his voice was anything to go by. “Hey, shh, it’s okay,” I whispered uselessly, trying to soothe him. I started to rub circles on his back like Louise did to me when I needed to calm down, hoping this would get him to relax. I heard his quick breaths gradually slowing down to a normal pace, and felt his body – which had gone rigid while he was talking – loosen up a bit against me. I have never seen Phil this angry before, but hell, was that anger justified.

He took a deep breath before resuming. “But Martyn didn’t want to take over the family business. He didn’t want to study in business at all. He didn’t want my parents – who might as well be strangers to him – to set up his life for him. But he went along with what they said, and enrolled to his top choice of school with a scholarship in a business major. But two months after he started there, he switched his major to what he really wanted: psychology. And god, the arguments between him and my parents were intense and _scary_.

“In the end, Martyn refused what my parents wanted him to do. And then all of a sudden, my parents told me that their company wanted them to move to London, where the headquarters of this business was. But I knew that was absolute bullcrap. It was a nicer way of telling me that they were going to leave Martyn in America with no money or support while the rest of us moved to London.”

I inhaled a sharp breath at Phil’s words. “Your family actually left Martyn in America by himself?” I asked weakly.

I felt him nod beneath my chin. “Yeah.” His voice was hoarse and croaky. He coughed, trying to clear his throat before talking again.

“So we moved back to England, leaving my brother in America. And Dan, I miss him so much. My parents just _left_ him there. And I’m so worried about him. Do you have any idea how _expensive_ university in America is? And he’s there by himself with no money. He can’t even call or text me because international calls are too expensive for him, but he emails me. He tells me he’s fine, but how is someone fine when their family leaves them?”

“Oh, Phil,” I whispered quietly. My heart ached for him after hearing these words tumble out of his mouth. I couldn’t fathom his situation; I couldn’t _imagine_ how hard all this must have been on him, let alone his brother. I held him closer to me, his chest flush against mine, and squeezed him tightly. “I’m so sorry.”

He stayed limp in my arms, as if drained of energy and too exhausted and weary to do or say anything else. After a few moments of quick breaths filling the silent room, he started to wiggle against me. I loosened my hold on him, and he slowly moved out of my arms for a moment. He was looking up at the ceiling, avoiding my gaze. I could see him biting his trembling bottom lip, holding back the tears that were threatening to spill out. “Phil…” I breathed, not knowing what to say, but only knowing that I didn’t want to see him like that.

When his breathing calmed to a slower tempo, he turned back to look at my direction. He still had tears in his eyes, but he was trying to hold them back. He still averted my gaze, maintaining his stare on my shirt instead. Then he started to slowly shuffled back towards me.

But instead of curling up into a ball next to me, he was moving on top of me. He hastily threw one leg over my hips and kept the other leg on the other side of me. I gulped and stared up at him incredulously. I couldn’t think of any good reason for Phil to be doing this, but now was probably the least appropriate time for Phil to straddle me.

But he didn’t continue to sit on my hips. Instead, he leaned forward until he was fully laying on top of me, with his legs still hooked around my hips. This couldn’t possibly be a comfortable position for him. I voiced my concern. “Are you…comfortable like this?”

He buried his head under my chin, right above my collarbones. He was nodding in response. His hot tears fell on my skin. We lay there like that for a moment. Our chests were right on top of one another, his breathing falling in sync with mine.

Then I felt lips moving. “Martyn and I used to lie like this when we were younger,” he murmured. “I would lie on top of him and he would hold me and rock me back and forth until I fell asleep. We stopped cuddling like this when we grew older, because I got older and heavier.”

His head suddenly jolted up, the process unfortunately causing it to forcefully bang against my chin and make my own head snap back. “Phil, _shit,_ ” I groaned and squeezed my eyes shut as the pain rushed through me. “What was that for?”

“Dan, I’m so sorry!” He sounded horrified, panic evident in his voice. “Are you okay? Did I hurt you?”

I grunted as an inadequate response and started to rub my chin, the pain slowly reducing into small throbs. When I opened my eyes, I saw Phil staring at me with large eyes filled with worry but now lacking tears, as they had involuntarily fallen down his cheeks. He hastily wiped them away.

I tilted my own head in question at him. When he was certain that I wasn’t hurting anymore, a sheepish look passed his face. “Sorry, I just…I know I’m not six anymore. I wanted to make sure if this was okay for you, if I’m too heavy to lie on you like this.” I didn’t respond, just stared at him with wide eyes as my mind went blank. He started to shift uncomfortably and moved to get off. “Sorry, I just realised that this could be so incredibly awkward for you. I’ll just get off…”

Without thinking, my hands flew to grab his hips, forcing him to stay where he was. It was his turn to give me a questioning look, and my turn to look sheepish. “I, uh, it’s okay,” I stammered. “You weigh, like, one kilo. I don’t mind.”

He didn’t seem to think anything of my awkward permission. He just chuckled – the first laugh I’d heard from him since the forest – and leaned back into me. I felt his light laughter bubbling from his chest against me. His face snuggled further into me before he replied, “That would be worrying, if I really did weigh one kilo.”

We relapsed into silence again, allowing me to take in what he told me earlier. I didn’t understand how people would choose their jobs over their children to such a grand degree that they would actually consider _leaving_ their son in another country to fend for himself. It was ridiculous, absolutely _ridiculous_. But as absurd as it was, it _actually_ happened.

My mind flashed back to when I first met Phil in October, when I encountered the boy with zero expression on his face and it had irked the hell out of me. It finally dawned on me that he wasn’t bored, shy, nervous, or uninterested. He had looked like all the life had been drained out of his face. And I finally understood why.

“Do you…want me to continue?” I heard him ask hesitantly. “It’s definitely alright if you say no. I’m sorry for telling you all this, you probably didn’t want me to…”

“Phil,” I said sternly, cutting off his worried rambling. “What the hell, don’t you _dare_ apologise. I’m not glad that this happened to you, but I’m glad you told me. And you can tell me anything, _anything_ , at any time, so don’t ever worry about wasting my time, because you’re not.”

He didn’t say anything for a while. I almost thought I said something wrong and offensive due to his lack of response. But then he snaked his arms around my neck and hugged me tighter. “You’re absolutely wonderful, Dan,” he murmured against my skin. “Thank you.”

I hummed in response. I was mindlessly rubbing his back in a circular motion, causing him to relax on top of me. We were quiet, the only noises were the rustling of the sheets when we moved and our exhalations of breaths.

He started talking again, softly and tentatively. “Now my parents want _me_ to take over their business in the future. It’s like…they completely forgot about Martyn. I hate that. I also hate the idea of having my life planned out. I…want to be a writer, Dan. To do something that makes _me_ happy, to do something _I_ want. And I’m not even fifteen yet and here I am, being told that my dreams are pathetic and useless and won’t get me anywhere in life. Here I am, already stressed out about my future.”

It was quite different from what own my parents said. “ _You can be anything you want to be, Dan,_ ” they assured me. I blinked, glancing around the room I was in. As grand and luxurious and expensive Phil’s home was, I felt somewhat more fortunate. Although I didn’t have a rich lifestyle like Phil did, I had loving and supporting parents, which was a priceless gift _._ And it upset me to know that he didn’t. That his parents would leave their child in another country without a second thought or worry.

“It’s not useless, Phil,” I murmured. “You writing stories isn’t hurting anyone. What do they want you to do, study business books all day? You’re fourteen.”

I knew that wasn’t the most reassuring and empathetic thing to say, I was never one who knew how to make someone feel better. But he seemed to accept that response, nodding his head and mumbling something against my neck.

I turned my head to the side, and my small movement prompted him to raise his head from my neck. He moved to rest his chin on my chest while looking up at me. I stared back at the mess of emotions in his eyes.

“Thank you for listening to me,” Phil murmured. He shifted against me again and moved his head so his face was hovering above mine, but he wasn’t looking at me anymore. Instead, he paid attention to my hair. His fingers tentatively started to twist through it, curling the hair that was already curled enough from the rain.

I studied his face while his fingers threaded through my hair. I attempted to read the expressions that were dancing across his face – sometimes anger appeared, sometimes sadness flickered, sometimes calmness took over. Tears had welled up in his eyes again, threatening to fall.

“That must have been so difficult to deal with, Phil,” I said softly. I was afraid my voice would crack under my emotions. “I’m so sorry.”

His eyes flickered down to mine before glancing back at my hair. “I miss my brother,” he mumbled again. “But…I’m glad you’re here. You’re like a brother to me. That’s…that’s why I was so upset earlier when you yelled at me. I didn’t want you to be mad at me. I didn’t…want to lose you too. And I think…” he paused, hesitating before continuing. “I think you’re my best friend.”

I tried to ignore the heat rising in my cheeks – Jesus, I couldn’t take a compliment, could I? I offered him a tiny smile, and reached to ruffle his hair playfully. He gave a small cry in surprise and smacked at my hand, trying to keep me from messing up his hair even further.

I had no idea how to offer proper reassurance, even though I wanted to and even though my heart hurt for him. So I cautiously tested the waters with directing the mood into a lighter atmosphere. “What, did you cuddle with your brother this much and have a fetish with playing with his hair too?”

The sadness flickering on his face seemed to reduce a bit. Because in retaliation, he cheekily grabbed onto a fistful of my hair and yanked at it – not too harshly, but not too gently either. I winced, hissing at the ache. “Why is it,” he started, “that whenever I say something nice to you, you turn red and start teasing me? A ‘thank you’ or something would be enough, you know.”

I didn’t answer him, looking away and staring resolutely at the window across the room.

“And to answer your question,” he continued. “Yes, I always cuddled with my brother. I like cuddles, especially with him. And no, his hair wasn’t long enough for me to play with, he always kept it short. He used to play with my hair though.”

I sighed and closed my eyes and let Phil to continue running his fingers through my curls. When I opened my eyes, I saw him staring at me and I almost jumped up in surprise. “You…like this, don’t you?” he asked timidly.

“Mhmm,” I hummed in response while keeping my eyes trained on him. We stared at each other, his eyes boring into mine. His eyes, usually so bright and lit with happiness, were now dark, formed by his negative emotions. And I didn’t know what to feel about this, having dark, sapphire blue staring and searching into my own brown eyes.

I blushed again as we stared at each other longer. Only now did I realise how bloody _intimate_ all this was. I knew that he didn’t think so, as cuddling and playing with my hair were just innocent sibling-like acts to him. But Phil was on top of me. He’d just completed revealing his family secrets to me, and was now running his fingers through my hair and staring at me, and only _now_ did I realise how physically and emotionally intimate these past couple hours had been. His weird version of “cuddling”.

My cheeks refused to cool down, so I dropped my gaze. I suddenly found the green material of his shirt fascinating.

“I…” he started hesitantly, but then trailed off. I flickered my eyes up at him at the sound of his voice, but, when I did, he leaned in to rest his forehead against mine. I held my breath. Fucking shit, now I really didn’t know what to do.

“Thank you so much, Dan,” he murmured while holding my gaze. His eyes were so close, and they were so captivating. I couldn’t look away this time.

“I didn’t do anything,” I whispered. I should probably push him away at this point. We were too close for me to be comfortable with. But I was frozen, waiting for his next move.

He shook his head slightly, causing his nose to lightly rub against mine. “Yes, you did,” he insisted. “You listened. You cared. You’re still here with me. That’s all I could ask for.”

Now it was my turn to shake my head. Our noses rubbed together harder, making him giggle a bit. “Phil, you’re my friend. That’s what friends do, be there for each other. You can always come tell me anything. I… I know I’m not the one with the best ‘cheering up’ advice, but I’ll still listen.”

“And again, that’s all I could ask for,” he repeated quietly, giving me a tiny encouraging smile.

Silence blanketed us again. My mind was annoyed with me, because I wouldn’t listen to its screams to get up and go home. It stopped raining a while ago, and darkness had already fallen.

But instead, my hands slowly travelled to hold his waist, small and thin and fitting perfectly in my hold. My thumbs were rubbing the area with circular movements. His hands were still in my hair, playing with it even after I broke off our gaze to look at his shirt, his posters, his room, _anything_. As fascinating as Phil’s eyes were, I couldn’t keep looking at them. There were too many intense emotions swimming in his eyes, and I felt like I was drowning in them.

When Phil started talking again, his voice was soft and quiet. But it sliced through the air, sliced through the silence, and I flinched in surprise when I heard him.

“You’re not mad at me anymore, are you?” he asked uncertainly while chewing on his bottom lip nervously as he waited for my answer.

My eyebrows drew together in confusion. “Why would I be mad at you now? After everything you told me? I’m…proud of you.”

His lips parted in shock. Surprise visibly erased his timid uneasiness, and was quickly followed by happiness. “You’re proud of me?” he whispered, disbelief clear in his voice.

“Of course I am, Phil,” I comforted him. “Nothing that you told me today was easy to talk about. But you went through with it, talked about everything from start to finish. Which must have been so tough for you to talk about – Hell, it was tough for me to _listen_ to something so upsetting. But you did it, and I’m proud of you.”

His parted lips slowly turned into a grin. He beamed, and I smiled at him in return. God, his face was so unfair. His eyes, his smile, his laugh, his _everything_ made someone else light up in happiness as well. A literal fucking ball of sunshine, that was what he was.

There were three loud taps on his door, jolting us back into reality. With one last smile, he slowly got off of me and, instead of verbally granting the visitor permission, went to open the door himself. I saw him wiping away the remaining tears on his face as he walked away. I sighed, leaned back into the bed, and closed my eyes, waiting for Phil to return.

“Dan?” Phil called, causing me to unwillingly open my eyes.

“Hmm?”

“Dan, your mother is downstairs,” a voice that didn’t belong to Phil said. I turned my head towards the door to see Mr. Alexander’s silhouette. “She wants you to return home.”

“My mother’s here?” I asked disbelievingly. Was it that late that my mother had to pick me up? I took my phone out of my pocket and groaned when I saw the time: 21:24. Although nine p.m. wasn’t that late, it was twenty-four minutes past my curfew. I glanced up at Mr. Alexander and reluctantly nodded. “Alright, I’ll be down in a minute.”

“Mrs. Howell and I will be waiting in the entrance hall when you’re ready, Dan,” the butler informed me. He closed the door after I nodded again.

I got off the bed to retrieve my bag, then turned back to Phil, who was watching me pack my belongings. “Hey, Phil?” I started to ask as I moved towards him.

“Yeah?”

I walked over to Phil, dropped my bag on the ground, and engulfed him in a hug. His surprise quickly faded as he reciprocated the embrace.

We held each other tightly for a moment. I was slightly taller than him – albeit probably only by a couple centimetres – so I ducked my head to look at him in the eye.

“If you ever need somewhere to stay, or feel like you’re not comfortable when your parents are home, come to my place,” I assured him. “If you don’t want to stay home, just know that my place can be your second home. If you…let me tell my parents the situation – I promise they won’t tell anyone or judge you for it – they would love to have you over as many times as you want and to stay over as long as you want.”

He blinked rapidly, either to dispel his shock at my offer of hospitality or to hold back tears, but he nodded and offered me a huge grin. He dived in for another hug and whispered, “Thank you, Dan. So much. You’re…absolutely wonderful.”

His arms slowly dropped their hold on me after we hugged for a decent amount of time. I picked up my backpack and followed him towards the door.

However, he wasn’t opening the door. “Phil?”

He turned back to me, biting his lip and rocking back and forth nervously on the balls of his feet. I tilted my head in confusion, and opened my mouth again to question him –

But then he quickly leaned forward and pecked my cheek, then promptly rocked back on his feet, and shyly smiled at me while his cheeks dusted pink.

One of my hands slowly lifted to touch the spot that Phil kissed. Although he had fully kissed me on the lips yesterday, that kiss had made me flush in confusion and shock and anger. A charm to cheer me up, he had told me.

 _This_ one was only a quick peck on the cheek – literally how my grandma kisses me – and it made me flush brighter for completely different reasons. Because I knew this was for _me_ , to show his appreciation for _me_ , and not in hopes of stopping my crying. I gave him a small smile, still holding that spot with my hand.

“That was another way of me telling you ‘thank you’. I hope that was okay with you,” he explained timidly while fidgeting with his shirt, even though I already guessed the reason why. I nodded in response, not knowing how to respond verbally. He finally opened the door for me, and I eventually dropped my hand from my cheek.

I didn’t care that my mother and the butler were going to be met with two pink-faced boys with shy smiles on their faces.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Vague Descriptions of Straight Smut (omg yay straight smut.. everyone's favorite..), Slightly Angsty

****Two years later** **

I squinted irritably as the bright sunlight flushed warmed my skin. It was way too hot and sunny and bright for March. This was supposed to be the fucking month for rain, not the month where I needed to feel like I was walking through the scorching fires of Hell. The universe already knew I was heading there, so couldn’t it have waited until I was dead for me to experience these extremely torturous temperatures?

“Why is it so bloody _hot_ these days,” I groaned as I shifted my head to get more comfortable on PJ’s lap.

An object suddenly fell on top of my face, making the world go dark before my eyes. It took me a moment to recognise it – the flimsy sketchbook that PJ used for doodling – and realised that PJ was using my face as a table to draw on. Rude.

“What the hell, PJ,” I grumbled as I slapped the notebook off my face, hoping that it messed up his doodle in the process. He laughed and smacked my cheek gently.

“Stop using me as a pillow, Dan.” I grunted grouchily but dutifully sat up. I was tired from the high temperature, and was convinced that the sun was absorbing my energy for its extra heat. I wanted to sleep because I was so _exhausted_ , but obviously I couldn’t. I fell asleep during lunchtime before and let’s just say that it was a one-way ticket to the headmaster’s office when a sleeping six-foot tall idiot was discovered curled up on the school’s courtyard rather than attending his next lesson.

“Mate, your face is incredibly red,” someone pointed out. I turned to glare at Jim, who was happily sitting in the shade under a tree with his arm wrapped around his girlfriend Tanya.

“That’s because my face has been getting _burnt off_ by the damn sun for the past twenty minutes,” I complained crankily. Although I was trying to blame my current irritation on the heat, I knew what was really ticking me off. Two out of the three most important people were missing. Again. At least PJ was here. But Elise and Phil were missing. And all of my friends around me also recognised that their absences were fuelling my frustration.

“Where are Phil and Elise?” PJ asked for me. Bless him, he was a godsend for saving me from asking that question and sparing me from appearing too desperate.

“I think I saw Elise inside with Louise and Zoe,” Joe answered, munching loudly on his sandwich.

PJ pursed his lips. “They’ve both been acting really weird lately.” He turned and offered me a sympathetic look. “Especially when they’re around Dan.”

“Maybe Elise is cheating on Dan and shagging Phil in secret,” Chris exclaimed cheekily.

Joe choked on his sandwich while Caspar threw his head back and guffawed. “Fuck, that’d be _hilarious_ ,” Caspar wheezed out, trying to catch his breath from laughing so hard. “Could you even _imagine_?”

I groaned again, burying my face into my hands and squeezing my eyes shut, while trying to will the impending migraine away. “Fuck off, Caspar, or I’ll kick your arse so hard you’ll be flying all the way back to South Africa,” I warned, causing him to crack up even further. Normally, I would be in the mood for snarky jokes. But now, in the midst of my irritation, I didn’t need to be filled with the thought of my girlfriend and my best friend fucking.

I looked up just in time to see PJ rolling his eyes. “That would be _something_ ,” he started. “Though Phil is _literally_ the worst liar ever. You can see the guilt on his face when he goes to Dan’s place and eats his cereal, for god’s sakes.”

Chris rolled his eyes too, then suddenly started to grin widely. “Well, speak of the devil,” he taunted teasingly.

My head whipped to the direction of Chris’s gaze, and soon enough my vision was met with Phil walking towards us while chewing his lip nervously.

“I don’t know, man. Chris might be right. Phil looks guilty as hell,” Joe joined in.

Everyone had noticed Phil’s recent nervousness. How could they not? It was a drastic change from his usual behaviour. Normally, he was bright and cheery and always beaming. And he was glued to my hip, never usually leaving my side. But recently, he had been jumpy when anyone – especially me – talked to him, and constantly stammered out his sentences, while his words were usually filled with confidence and happiness.

When he reached our group, he took a seat next to Caspar. “Hey, guys,” he greeted, but we all heard the tremble in his voice.

“What’s up, mate?” Jim nodded at him with a friendly smile on his face.

“Are you alright?” Tanya interjected, her soft eyes trying to encourage Phil to relax.

“I, uh. Yeah, I mean yes. Yes, I’m fine,” Phil stumbled on his words.

No one was buying it. PJ reached out to touch Phil’s hand and smiled at him kindly. “You sure, Phil?” he asked, tilting his head. “You’ve been really on edge for the past two weeks.”

Phil heaved out an annoyed sigh. This had been a routine for the past couple days, in which Phil would join us for lunch about five minutes before we had to go to our next lesson while looking all nervous and twitchy. His arrival always started off with everyone trying to get Phil to talk to us about his problem. With all jokes aside, everyone was concerned for him. And now he seemed sick and tired of receiving the constant worried attention.

“I’m _fine_ ,” Phil insisted, crossing his arms over his chest.

Phil was avoiding my eyes. I moved to sit in front of Phil and cupped his cheek, gently turning his face to look at me.

“What’s wrong, Phil?” I murmured softly, looking into his large, anxious-ridden eyes. He sighed again, this time not with heavy exasperation but with defeat, and closed his eyes and nuzzled his nose into my palm.

“You two are nauseating,” Chris muttered, but I heard his soft tone. It wasn’t a new reaction; Phil and I had received comments like that from literally everyone. Our close friendship used to get teased more harshly, but eventually everyone had grown used to our closeness and their mocking tone ultimately reduced to fondness mixed with joking insults.

I ignored Chris. Everyone watched us in silence as my free hand snaked to hold one of Phil’s. I still kept my other hand on his cheek, my thumb softly rubbing circles along his cheekbone. It was so goddamn unfair that he got high cheekbones at age seventeen while my cheeks still stubbornly held onto their baby fat, even though I was only five months younger.

“Can I talk to you alone?” he whispered, opening his eyes and looking at me through his eyelashes. As if I’d reject a request to comfort him. He should know me better by now.

“Of course.” We rose from the grass, and I brushed some of the dirt off my trousers.

The patient silence that our friends had temporarily offered us was broken when Chris started to tease me. “You got some dirt on your arse, mate.” He gave me a cheeky slap on my bum, causing me to yelp and kick him hard in the shin. He groaned at the pain, but a smirk tried to replace his grimace when everyone hooted with laughter.

“Fuck off, Chris” I muttered. Phil slipped his hand in mine and tugged it gently. I turned to my friends and told them, “We’ll be back,” before letting Phil pull me away.

When Phil dragged me a good distance away from everyone, he turned to face me. He didn’t say anything for a while, his eyes looking a bit distracted as he tried to gather his words.

I studied him while I waited for him to talk. He was a bit taller than me now, different from when we first met in Year 10 and it was the other way around. Honestly, these past two and a half years have been a mini competition between our heights, me superseding him one moment, and then him overtaking me the next. But it was never a drastic difference between our heights, as we’ve always been a couple centimetres apart at most.

His black hair was glossy and neatly styled to a fringe, similar to mine but swiped to the opposite side of his face. I was always envious of his hair. It always looked so good without him even trying. And then here I was struggling to manage my crazy mess of curls. I was always trying to straighten the shit out of it to hide the curls, but a little sweat or water always threatened to coil my straight strands.

His hair wasn’t the only feature of his that I was envious of. Hell, his whole face was unfair. High cheekbones; huge, pretty eyes; smooth, flawless skin; he had everything that I still lacked.

He took a deep breath, the noise jolting me back to reality.

“I need to tell you something, Dan,” he breathed. I could hear his voice quiver.

I nodded my head encouragingly. “I’m listening.”

“I just hope…you don’t judge me because of it,” he whispered weakly, his eyes large with apprehension. “And that you’ll still be my friend?”

His words were freaking me out, and suddenly Chris’s accusation popped into my mind. “Are you cheating on me?” I blurted out the question that I was meant to ask Elise.

The fear in his eyes momentarily morphed into confusion. “ _What?_ ” he asked incredulously. He furrowed his eyebrows and his eyes searched my face, trying to figure out why I’d said that. “What does that mean?”

My cheeks burned and I cringed at my outburst. Why did I even consider Chris’s joke? And why the hell did I phrase it like _that_? “S-sorry,” I stammered. “I didn’t mean to say it like that. Chris was being a dick earlier and said you and Elise were…shagging, because you two have been acting odd recently.”

His eyes were comically wide in disbelief. “I would never do that, Dan, for _so_ _many_ reasons. And I…I’m about to tell you one of them.”

That was a weird way to transition. But I bit my lip nervously and nodded again as I waited for his response as well as for my unease to reduce.

“Okay, okay, okay,” he repeatedly whispered, the tremor in his voice still evident. He started to fidget with his fingers, then quickly switched to bite his nails, all while avoiding my eyes and staring at the ground before us. “Okay, I can do this,” he muttered to himself. I could practically see his knees wobbling and hear his breath quickening. He kept wiping his palms on his shirt, and I was sure that the sweat on his palms wasn’t due to the heat.

His nervous energy started to fill me with panic. Just looking at his unsettling state made my own breaths quick and shallow. I could feel the blood pulsing in my temples. “Phil,” I begged. “Tell me what’s wrong. Please, you’re scaring me. I hate seeing you like this.”

“I just…” he sighed finally, the exhalation seeming like he just blew out all the energy in him. Because now his face looked drained of colour. He turned his head and looked at the emptying courtyard, with people packing up their belongings and leaving as a loud bell marked the end of lunch. “I don’t want you to…think of me as any different because of it. I still want you to be my best friend.”

The curiosity was gnawing at my mind, but I tried to suppress it in hopes of appearing calm and patient for Phil. I took a step closer to him, then another, until I was standing right in front of him. I draped my arms around him and pulled him tight against me, my chin sitting on his shoulder. His momentarily motionless state caused by his surprise disappeared as his own arms wrapped around me, his cheek resting on my shoulder while he still kept his gaze on the courtyard.

Phil was the kind of person who communicated through hugs. It was one of the reasons why he always gave them out. Usually cheerful and positive, he constantly offered hugs as a method to share his happiness with others. Sometimes, being enveloped in his arms was a way for Phil to show his appreciation or gratitude.

However, I learned that his hugs didn’t only entailed positive intentions. Hugging was a means of escapism to him, a way to avoid difficulties and pain trough the affectionate warmth created by two people and the circle of protection and security from those hardships.

For him, hugging offered him comfort. And he always resorted to hugging me when he needed the strength to tell me something that would otherwise be incredibly difficult for him to say.

“Phil, you should know me better by now,” I murmured into his hair. “I would never judge you.”

But he didn’t hold onto me for long, releasing me quickly after his mini panic-attack resided. We were still in school, we were still in public. Hugging for too long resulted in uncomfortable stares and judgments from others, and extra judgment was obviously the last thing Phil wanted right now.

When he pulled away, his gaze finally shifted from the courtyard to me. I smiled at him reassuringly, encouraging him to share his problems with me. His shoulders relaxed a tad and he wasn’t anxiously chewing his lip raw anymore.

He finally opened his mouth while his eyes cautiously held mine. “Dan, I’m –”

He didn’t finish. He cut himself off and pursed his lips instead. I tilted my head and opened my own mouth to ask him why he had interrupted himself. “Phil?”

“Dan? Phil?” A female voice called from behind me.

I instantly sighed fondly – it was a reflex reaction. I could recognise that crystal-clear voice, that sweet strawberry-vanilla scent, from anywhere. I turned around and greeted Elise with a grin.

She smiled back when I pecked her lips. “I don’t mean to interrupt you two,” she mumbled against my lips. When I pulled away, I melted slightly at the sight of the blush blooming on her cheeks, the shy smile planted on her lips. You’d think that after thirteen months of dating that I’d be used to her adorable charm. “But lessons start in five minutes, so unless you two want to be late…”

I tucked her strawberry-blonde hair behind her ears. “Thanks, Elise.” I leaned in to kiss her on the cheek, causing her to laugh and playfully slap me away, making me grin wider.

Her flustered face was quickly replaced with concern when she looked at Phil, who now had a polite smile on his face. “I know I probably interrupted a conversation, I’m sorry,” she apologised before quickly pecking Phil on the cheek. He chuckled lightly at her affection, causing her to smile and diminishing the regret in her eyes. “It’s just that, we have…” she pulled out her phone and groaned slightly when she saw the time, “…four minutes.”

“You go to lessons, we’ll go in a minute,” I assured her. She nodded and quickly smiled at us before turning to head back inside. However, she hastily stopped her movements and turned back to me. “Remember about tonight, Dan!” she called with a grin, but it seemed stiff around the corners. The grin looked visibly forced. I tried not to frown. Why were my best friend and my girlfriend acting so _weird_ around me today?

I watched her walk away, almost forgetting that Phil was still standing next to me. So when his fingers wrapped around my wrist, I flinched in surprise at the sudden touch. “Come on, Romeo,” he teased, pulling me to follow him back into our school building. “We’re going to be late.”

“I was Benvolio, not Romeo,” I muttered, causing him to roll his eyes. But even when he attempted to look annoyed, there was a small smile on his face.

I glanced at him as we walked to our classrooms. “What was it that you wanted to tell me earlier?”

He bit his lip again, his gaze dropping to the ground. “I’ll…tell you later. Can I meet you at our spot tonight?”

 _Damn it,_ I thought as the instant regret coursed through me. “I’m sorry, Phil,” I apologised, the guilt heavily infiltrating my voice. “But I can’t tonight. I’m going over to Elise’s place after rehearsal and staying the night.”

His shoulders sagged, but he nodded understandably. “Alright, that’s okay. I’ll tell you tomorrow, then. I just don’t want to tell you over the phone.”

We reached my classroom with one-minute left, his classroom only a couple doors down from mine. I reached to take both of his hands and clasped them in mine, giving them a small squeeze. “I can always cancel for you, Phil, if it’s super important.” I paused as I considered the situation. “It _does_ seem super important.”

He shook his head. “No, I would feel bad. Don’t cancel on Elise.” He shrugged his shoulders, attempting to appear casual when I knew an internal tornado of emotions was swirling within him at the moment. “Besides, it would give me more time to make sure I’m ready.”

Before I could say anything, he gave he a quick hug and a last smile before hurrying to his next lesson.

I sighed as I watched him go. I didn’t know which emotion was winning right now: curiosity or worry.

\- x -

“God, Elise, you should see what Caspar can do with his body,” I marvelled as we finished up homework on her bedroom floor.

She snickered, and it took me a while to comprehend why that smirk was planted on her lips. My cheeks started to heat up, and I slapped her shoulders lightly. “Not like _that!”_ I whined before burying my face into my hands.

“I’m sorry!” I peeked at her through my fingers. She was biting her lip to hold back her impending laughter, but the amusement was visible in the rosiness of her cheeks and the brightness in her green eyes. “When you literally give _no context_ to what that means, what do you think I’m going to assume?”

“Shut up,” I grumbled while I plopped myself on her bed. I opened my arms for her and pouted my lips. “Elise, I’m tired and I need you.”

She bit her lip and shifted uneasily, but her hesitance was quickly replaced by a smile before she crawled onto the bed and crept into my arms. My arms enveloped her as she rested her head on my chest.

“In context,” I started to say as I played with her hair, further curling her wavy hair, “Caspar can twist probably every single part of his body. I think that’s the only reason why our theatre director casted him in _Pippin_. He can’t sing or act, honestly. But _fuck_ , can he dance. And he’s flexible as hell.”

“Didn’t you tell me that having special gymnastic moves were, like, bonus points for the _Pippin_ auditions?” she mumbled as she snuggled further into me.

“Yeah, it’s sort of a circus type of musical. People who can do gymnastics and other acrobatics are a definite plus,” I explained. “But I can’t do any of that.”

She giggled. “I know, I can’t even imagine you touching your toes.”

I huffed indignantly. “I can most definitely touch my toes.”

“Wow,” she gasped sarcastically. “Look at that, I’m learning new things about you every day.”

I groaned. “You’re _terrible_.”

“Yet here you are, in my bed.”

“Yet here I am, about to leave.”

Her shoulders started to shake, and I felt the laughter rippling from her chest against me. Her laughter triggered a large grin to grow on my face as well, my cheeks aching as the smile stretched from ear to ear.

“You’re adorable,” I heard her whisper when her laughter died down.

“Stop talking about yourself in second-person, Elise,” I teased.

She burst into giggled again, but when she shuffled to look at me, she tried to look cross as she furrowed her eyebrows and narrowed her eyes at me. “Could you accept a compliment for once in your life?”

“What compliment?” I feigned ignorance as my hands travelled to hold her waist and gently bring her on top of me.

She didn’t answer me at first, instead shuffled to move on top of me. When I looked up at her, my smile threatened to curve into a frown. There shouldn’t be so many emotions – _negative_ emotions – dancing across her face. I knew I couldn’t accept a compliment, but that shouldn’t be evoking _guilt_ from her.

Before I could say anything, she placed her hands on my cheeks and leaned in to kiss me. As soon as her lips touched mine, I instantly tried to forget my worries. I was probably just seeing things. I’ve been told that I worry too much, and my concerns were probably nothing.

A soft sigh escaped my mouth. One of my hands crept under her shirt and rested on the small of her back, while the other tangled in her hair.

Her mouth travelled to skim my jawline with her lips before progressing down to my neck. She tugged the collar of my shirt down to expose my collarbones before her mouth hovered over them. “That compliment I just gave you. That you’re adorable,” she breathed, the air lingering on my skin.

“I don’t think most guys want to be called adora – _fuck, Elise,_ ” I gasped sharply as her mouth latched onto my collarbones, sucking lightly at it while her tongue flicked over the skin. Her teeth teasingly grazed over my collarbones, but didn’t sink down to bite at them. Instead, her lips glided over to my neck and softly pressed to its side.

“Damn it, Dan. Beautiful, then.” Her warm breath washed over my neck, sending shivers down my spine.

I didn’t get a chance to respond as she dipped her head into my neck further before sucking on it harshly, a huge contrast to the soft force she had applied onto my collarbones. I panted as I felt her hands slip under my shift and move across my stomach, one hand trailing around my torso while the other held down my hips. My own hands flew to grasp her waist firmly and pull her tightly against me, the abrupt grip causing her to lose her attention on my neck with a sharp intake of breath.

The temporary absence of attention to my neck sparked something in me as my mind cleared up from its previous state of pleasure. I gripped onto her as I flipped us over and hovered over her body. My hands were placed on the bed by either side of her head, practically caging her face in. She stared up at me with large green eyes filled with desire and anticipation, awaiting my next movements with want.

I cupped her cheek in my hand and leaned in until our foreheads touched. “I told you,” I mumbled against her lips, shifting slightly so that our noses rubbed together, “to stop talking about yourself in second-person. _You_ are adorable.” My head trailed to the side of her head to nibble on her earlobe. “Gorgeous.” My lips opened to suck on it, lapping my tongue gently over it. “Everyone who looks at you knows that, Elise.”

She sighed softly and turned her head to face me, making my teeth release its hold onto her earlobe to look at her. She placed a hand behind my head and brought my face closer to hers again and held my gaze. “You’re amazing, Dan,” she whispered. “Absolutely amazing.”

Our mouths found their way to attach together again, connecting and separating our lips slowly and lazily before my tongue licked across her bottom lip. Her lips parted slightly but just enough for my tongue to slip into her mouth and glide across hers. She moaned quietly as she let my tongue explore her past her lips, further strengthening my familiarity of her mouth.

Soon my tongue moved away from hers and instead massaged the roof of her mouth gently, gradually increasing the speed and force on it. She gasped again and her breath hitched, but she released a loud groan as I continued to apply more pressure onto the roof of her mouth, her mouth practically hanging at the sensation and so she wasn’t able to kiss me back properly.

“Dan, Dan, _Dan_ ,” she stuttered, repeating my name as if it was the only word she knew. She tugged at my shirt forcefully, trying to pull at it and lift it up. “Off, Dan, _off_.”

I reluctantly moved my mouth away from hers, the separation causing a wet sound to echo through the room. I tugged my shirt off and mindlessly threw it on the floor, her shirt and leggings accompanying it on the ground shortly after. Her hands travelled to grab onto my belt loops before pulling me closer, then her fingers hurriedly unfastened my button and zip before yanking my pants down to my knees. I shifted to help with the removal process, eventually eliminating the denim from my legs before chucking the pants aside.

Our lips reattached together again, more urgently as they rapidly moved against each other and not at all gentle and slow this time. My hands moved under her bra and cupped her breasts while her own hands slipped beneath my boxers and firmly gripped my bum before bringing my hips down against hers.

I smoothly unhooked her bra before throwing it aside. My effortless elimination of her bra was now such a huge contrast to when I had first undressed her months ago, when I couldn’t figure out how to unfasten the hooks on the bra for the life of me. She thought that was the funniest thing ever until over five unsuccessful minutes were spent on that goddamn thing. By the time she had ended up removing the bra herself, my erection had already softened and she wasn’t turned on or wet enough. What a sexy first time.

Our underwear and boxers were discarded afterwards, but I didn’t immediately dive in to kiss her again this time. My eyes wandered over her fully nude figure, and they appreciatively absorbed the fair skin illuminated by the dim lighting of the room, the small curves of her body, the pink nipples on her round breasts, the wavy strawberry-blonde hair cascading around her form, the emerald eyes hooded under her thick eyelashes.

She looked absolutely beautiful.

I almost forgot that I was supposed to act, to do _something_ , with the body she was exposing to me, for me. She grew increasingly shy under my scrutiny and a dark blush rapidly coloured her cheeks. “Stop staring at me,” she stammered timidly. “It always feels weird when you do.”

I chuckled and leaned in to kiss her forehead. “It’s your fault,” I murmured against her skin. “You’re perfect.”

She huffed indignantly, obviously not believing my statement. But in my eyes, she was. Of course, she wasn’t without flaws. Perfect didn’t equal flawless. She had some blemishes scattering her body; some of the skin on her ribs was slightly darker and didn’t match the rest of her body’s fair shade; she had stretch marks across her hips from her rapid growth spurt between Year 8 and 9. But her imperfections were what made her perfect in my eyes.

She turned her head to the side to avoid my eyes, still obviously bashful under my gaze. “Dan,” she groaned impatiently, but the fake irritation didn’t suppress the shyness in her voice. “Either fuck off or fuck me.”

“Wow, when you put it that way, so blunt and upfront,” I laughed as I shook my head in amusement.

She released a breathy laugh as well, then her face hesitantly turned back to face me.

I grinned at her and kissed her lips once more before my hand reached to open her bedside drawer and pulled out a condom packet.

\- x -

We moaned into each other’s mouths in attempts of quietening our noises as we both came down from our highs. But that was completely useless because our mouths hung open in pleasure and didn’t even join together properly, thus letting our groans echo loudly through the room. Thank fucking god that her parents were out of town.

She collapsed on top of me, her chest erratically panting and matching my own rapid gasps for air. “Fucking hell,” I huffed incoherently as I tried to slow down my breaths to a steadier tempo.

When she caught her breath, Elise rolled off of me onto the bed but curled up beside me. I pulled off the condom and tossed it into the bin by the bed. I drew the sheets up over us with one hand while tucking Elise into my chest with another. One of my arms wrapped around her waist as she further snuggled into me, and I willed myself to not relax into the position immediately and drift off yet.

“Mmm, gonna miss this,” she murmured mindlessly, almost as if she didn’t realise what she had just said.

I hummed in response, not exactly processing her words, and buried my head into her hair. I felt her sigh contently against my skin before she rested her forehead on my chest.

We fell into comfortable silence, our rapid breathing finally dropping into a normal tempo. My mind started to clear from its post-sex haze, and her earlier words finally hit me. I drew my eyebrows together in confusion. “What do you mean?” I asked curiously

“Hmm?”

“When you said you’re going to miss this?”

I couldn’t have imagined her body stilling. I tilted my head, not understanding her discomfort. “Elise?”

“It’s nothing,” she answered hastily. A pause. She probably knew I was going to ask her again, because she released a shaky breath and muttered, “I mean, when we go to uni. I’m gonna miss this.”

I didn’t know if she was intentionally trying to make me more confused. “Uni? But uni’s in two years – this is our first year in sixth form and we’re both still sixteen. Why are you worried about when we’re off at uni?”

When she didn’t answer immediately, I shifted away so I could look at her properly. “Elise?” I heard the worry in my voice that I was trying to suppress. “What’s going on?”

She shook her head and squeezed her eyes shut. “I don’t want to talk about it now,” she pleaded. She opened up her arms for me. “Please, come back.”

The panic alarm was still ringing in my head, but I tried to ignore it and reluctantly returned into her embrace. I held her awkwardly this time, and this wasn’t the sweet, loving cuddle we were wrapped in a couple minutes ago. This embrace was stiff. The air was tense. And we were both aware of it. But I didn’t know what was going on, I didn’t know what she was keeping from me that was making her too uncomfortable to reveal.

I knew I was being annoying for pestering her again, but the fact that she was hiding something from me that was making her uncomfortable was bothering me. “Elise,” I tried again, much to her dismay as I saw her shoulders sag. “Please. This is only going to bug me for the rest of the night.”

“But I don’t _want_ to talk about it tonight, Dan!” she suddenly blurted out, then slapped her hands over her mouth.

My eyes widened in shock. “Did I do something wrong?” I asked weakly.

Her eyes softened and she shook her head. “No, sweetheart. You didn’t do anything wrong. It’s not you, it’s me. It’s completely just me, and…”

Even though I didn’t want to, somehow my mind automatically assumed the worst. _It’s not you, it’s me._ Oh god. Oh _no._ I didn’t listen to the rest of her sentence. I jerked away from her and jolted up. _It’s not you, it’s me_. Those damned words. Those _cursed_ words. They were the infamous words people told their significant other when…

“Are you…you’re not…what the _hell_ is going on, Elise?” I demanded, not at all caring if I sounded angry or impatient this time. Because she put me in panic-mode, and I couldn’t control the dread starting to occupy my mind at the moment.

She turned to bury her face into a pillow, her frustrated groan quieted by the object. When she spun around to look at me, there were tears welling up in her eyes. Tears. Fucking hell, no, no, _no._ This wasn’t happening. “I didn’t want to do this tonight, Dan!”

I gaped at her, my eyes comically large as if she had just admitted to murder. She might as well be doing just that, because she was murdering my heart right now. “You didn’t want to do _what_ tonight?” I shouted heatedly.

“I didn’t want us to… I didn’t want our last night like… Not tonight!” she screamed, her words incoherent and jumbled. “I wasn’t planning on this tonight!”

“Elise, just spit it out!”

“What do you _think_ I’m going to say?”

The whole room went deadly silent. And her flushed face from her heated words dissipated as the guiltiest look I have ever seen crossed her face.

Realisation was flooding into me in a scarily fast rate. My mind was racing at a speed so rapid that I felt dizzy. “We just had sex,” I whispered feebly, trying to grasp onto the weak straws of this situation. My quiet words sounded strangled and broken.

I didn’t notice the tears that had been trickling down my cheeks until the warm drops plopped onto my bare thighs. I opened my mouth to yell, to scream in frustration, but the only sound emitted was a broken sob. The tears that Elise had been trying to hold back finally spilled at the sight of me crying. She grabbed my hands and brought them up to her lips before kissing my knuckles, then rested her forehead on top of them. “Please don’t cry, Dan,” her voice quivered.

“Did I do something wrong?” I repeated hoarsely, the tears unstopping its rapid flow. I was drowning in too many emotions at the moment, none of them positive. Sorrow, heartbreak, anger, and confusion were the most prominent.

She shook her head furiously. “ _No_ , Dan,” she tried to soothe, her voice practically begging me to calm down. “Let me explain. Stop crying, _please_.”

The last thing I wanted to do was listen. I wanted to throw a tantrum, to punch my fist against a wall or throw heavy books around the room or _something_ to release my emotions. But in the midst of my frustration, I was undoubtedly curious. I willed my throat to stop releasing its hideous noises, and nodded reluctantly.

She produced a trembling exhalation and shifted her gaze to the wall so she wouldn’t have to look at me. “I’ve been thinking about it for a while now,” she whispered almost inaudibly. “I think you’re great, Dan. Absolutely amazing. But we’re both turning seventeen soon, and we’ve been together for such a long time. And that’s been amazing, too. But I want us to… I want to…” She couldn’t finish her sentence. I snatched my hands away from her grasp.

“You want us to break up?” My words came out harsher than I intended for them to be.

She winced at my bluntness. “Don’t put it like that,” she pleaded.

“Why?” I hissed. “It’s the truth, isn’t it?”

“ _Let me explain_ ,” she insisted. When the room fell completely silent again, she hesitantly resumed talking. “I feel like we should… broaden our experiences. And not stick to one person for all throughout school, because you know everyone says that teenage relationships don’t last? Well, I was thinking it might be good to get some experiences with other people, instead of –”

“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” I interrupted insensitively, causing her to flinch and bite her quivering lip. But I couldn’t find it in myself to care. _Broaden our experiences_. What the actual _fuck?_! It wasn’t really the most appealing idea to throw away our thirteen months together so we could “broaden our experiences”.

“I must have done something wrong,” I tried again persistently, pleadingly. “There is no way you would suggest moving on to different people if I didn’t do something wrong.”

“It’s not you,” she repeated softly. She sounded as wrecked as I felt.

“Then _why,_ Elise?” I begged. A pause. Silence. No answer. My eyes widened as a possibility crossed my mind. I gasped sharply. “Are you cheating on me?”

“No!” she shouted with conviction. We locked eyes, my confused-ridden and heartbroken fury meeting her begging despair.

“Then why?” I asked, weaker this time as the anger drained out my body and all I could experience were sadness and exhaustion.

“I’m not cheating on you, Dan,” she whispered and dropped her gaze again. “You don’t deserve that. I’m doing this so… so you don’t get what you don’t deserve. So you’re not cheated on.”

That was the most _confusing_ fucking way that she could’ve phrased her excuse. But I understood what she was saying anyway. That there was someone else she wanted. So she was ending our relationship so she didn’t have to cheat on me with him.

A million questions whizzed through my mind, but my mouth blurted out, “Why did you have sex with me tonight? Why did you act like nothing was wrong?”

“Because I still love you,” she answered feebly. “But…”

“But you still slept with me even though you want someone else, Elise,” I cut off. I couldn’t even summon the energy to be angry anymore. I felt tired. Used. Confused. Stupid – so _stupid_ for being so blissfully oblivious.

“I didn’t want tonight to be the night for…this, Dan.” Her voice was beyond fragile. It was like broken glass.

I thought I was too exhausted, but my blood started to boil once more at her words. “So you slept with me, knowing that in a couple days you were going to dump me?” I seethed slowly.

Fresh tears spilled out of her eyes, and I had to restrain myself from wiping the waters away. Because she didn’t need me to take care of her. She didn’t need me. She didn’t want me.

This breakup was so sudden, so abrupt, so bloody _confusing_. I hadn’t even considered that she was contemplating on ending our relationship before now. I hadn’t even considered that for the past couple weeks, her distant presence was because she was interested in someone else. I hadn’t even considered that when I was planning to stay the night at Elise’s house that I would leave with the door of our relationship gently shutting in my face.

Just an hour ago, I told her she was gorgeous. I told her she was perfect. And she told me I was amazing. She let us sleep together.

And all while she was _planning_ to break up with me. All while she was planning to leave me for someone else.

I felt like I was suffocating. Fuck, I needed to escape. I needed to get out of here. I couldn’t stay in a room holding countless recollections of our history that I had previously treasured but now despised, with the memories now mocking me and choking me and tearing up my heart. I couldn’t stay in a room that belonged to the girl who I’d given my heart to for over a year, only to have its shattered pieces returned.

There were still many questions spinning through my head, but even my curiosity wasn’t strong enough to persuade me to stay here for any longer. I flew out of the bed and hastily started to put on my clothes, and she didn’t say anything to encourage me to stay. She didn’t say anything to reassure me this was only a joke. Fuck, she really _was_ ending our thirteen months, because obviously I wasn’t enough. Obviously I wasn’t caring enough, interesting enough, attractive enough to hold her attention forever.

She wanted us to broaden our experiences. I could’ve snorted.

To think that I actually believed that we were going to spend many years in the future together. This breakup was such an incredible shock; it was so out of the blue. I didn’t know how I could handle this tremendous influx of new information and negative emotions.

“I’m leaving,” I announced, trying to make my voice smooth and free from trembles.

“I’m so sorry, Dan,” I heard her whisper. But I didn’t turn around to acknowledge her. I left our relationship in this room without turning back.

\- x -

The water harshly beat down on my body with a burning heat, but I let the liquid scorch my skin and didn’t turn the valve to cool the temperature. The steam formed by the hot shower was thick in the air, almost suffocating me.

I had immediately stripped off my clothes and leapt into the shower when I came home, hoping that the warm cascading rivulet would help my mind fade into dullness and make everything a misty illusion. Showering usually calmed me, normally washing my worries and stress away into a relaxing emptiness.

But the shower’s magic wasn’t working tonight. The event at Elise’s house was still a fresh wound in my heart, and even the steaming water couldn’t help my intense grief fade into a dull throb. My hot tears were mixing with the hot drops from the shower, and I couldn’t distinguish between the waters on my face anymore.

I was scrubbing harshly – ignoring the pain flaring up when I rubbed the now sensitive skin – and trying to remove every single area that Elise had ever touched on my body, until every last trace of Elise had been expunged. My skin was practically raw and held a disgusting shade of red, and the scorching water temperature wasn’t helping to reduce the sore redness either.

I eventually grew tired of the constant harsh effort of scrubbing and closed my eyes to let the heat soak into my skin. I leaned my forehead against the cool tiles as my trembling legs threatened to buckle.

No matter how hard I tried to ward off memories of Elise, my brain decided to be my biggest enemy by resurfacing these unwanted thoughts.

I remembered the first time I had talked to Elise, when we were both casted in our school’s drama production of _Romeo and Juliet_ during Year 11. I played Benvolio, and she played Lady Capulet. Who would’ve known that the play would result in Romeo’s cousin and Juliet’s mother falling in love.

Every day at rehearsal, our teasing gradually started to evoke blushes and shy gazes. We were constantly trying to subtly look at each other, and went red when we got caught by the other. When we talked, I had struggled to ignore the rapid thumping of my heart. I had tried to make her smile, and every time I got a giggle or a laugh out of her mouth, my cheeks had flushed with accomplishment and pride.

Our first kiss was right after our first performance night, when all of the cast and crew members were running high on adrenaline long after the play had finished. Everyone had celebrated the success of our show, and after I gave and received hugs from my fellow cast mates, I immediately went to Elise. She had been excitedly talking to a friend, but I rudely interrupted the conversation and grabbed her wrist to pull her into me. And suddenly, we were kissing without giving a damn that all of our cast mates could see us.

My friends loved Elise. My parents loved Elise. I had loved Elise.

I unintentionally banged my head onto the shower tiles a little too hard, and hissed as the pain shot up.

I decided to step out of the shower before my body pruned like a raisin. The cold air slapped my skin as I entered my room, forcing me to sprint to my bed and dive under the blankets. I curled up in a foetus position and my body trembled. My eyes couldn’t produce any more tears – every single one had been spent. I have never felt more emotionally exhausted, more drained, in my life.

It was well past midnight, but I needed someone. I needed someone to hold and cry and complain to. The two people who I immediately went to for consolation were Phil and PJ. I could surely call PJ and wake him up, but I wouldn’t be able to receive his comfort physically. And I needed both physical and emotional comfort at the moment.

I quickly texted Phil, the desperation practically reeking through the message.

 ** **To Phil:**** Come to the forest. Please, I need you.


	8. Chapter 8

Phil didn't notice me at first when I arrived at our spot. He was pacing back and forth with a worried look on his face while muttering something unclear under his breath.

I stepped towards him, the movement causing the bushes to rustle. The noise caused Phil to stop moving, snap his head up and lock his eyes with mine. His eyes frantically searched my appearance, taking in the tears that I didn't recall allowing to fall again and my face that had gone red and blotchy.

"Dan," he breathed, the whisper so quiet that it was almost inaudible. The low volume of his voice didn't conceal his worry and distress. Concern was not only evident in the way he spoke, but also in the crinkles on his forehead and the blue eyes that were unmistakeably large behind his new glasses.

He started to move towards me but, before he could, I jumped him and flung my arms around him with such a force that he stumbled backwards.

He gasped sharply as his back slammed against a tree and threw an arm back against it to regain balance, but I didn't loosen my grip on him. I was basically crushing him with my weight, sandwiching him between me and the tree. I shoved my face into the crook of his neck and, for the millionth time tonight, started crying, making his top wet with my running nose and falling tears. A sob was caught in my throat, and all I could produce were rapid gulps of air and ugly, snivelling noises.

"Oh, Dan," he croaked out as his fingers gently stroked my hair to calm me down. My loud sobs were drowning out his quiet words, and all I could hear were soft murmurs of "I'm here" and "It's okay now" filling the air.

When my sobs started to reduce into broken hiccups, Phil's hands slowly travelled to my arms and gently pushed me to put some distance between us. I stared at him pleadingly, my eyes begging him to let me hold him.

I watched him helplessly as he chose to sit down against the tree instead. In my overly-emotional state, I started overreacting and panicking. Was _he_ pushing me away too? Was he tired of me? Was I not allowed to touch him, hold him, hug him anymore? Was he planning to break off our friendship tonight? How long had he been planning this?

My worries assuaged slightly when he reached up and tugged my hand. "Sit down with me," he whispered softly.

I exhaled shakily as I crouched down, choosing to crawl onto his lap rather than sitting in front of him. I wanted him to hold me, to reassure me, to let me vent and release my pent-up emotions, to help me forget. I wanted to be taken care of. Because I couldn't do this by myself. I couldn't handle this pain, this confusion, this betrayal all alone.

He let me situate myself on him, even helping me hook my legs around his hips, before his arms finally encircled my body. "What happened?" he tried again hoarsely, but I shook my head and leaned in to bury my face into his neck again. However, he caught my chin with his fingers and tilted my head up, forcing me to look at him.

My watery gaze met his worried eyes. My heavy pants were decelerating quickly, until I couldn't even breathe anymore. I was holding my breath while holding his gaze: soft, encouraging, concerned.

"Dan," he pleaded again. "Talk to me, please." His fingers started to comb through my hair again, causing me to ease up slightly against him. I exhaled unsteadily and, before he could say anything, ducked my head and buried it into the junction of his shoulder and neck, feeling the flood of tears threatening to spill from my eyes again.

Neither of us made a noise, both holding our breaths while waiting for the straining sniffles to finally stop eclipsing my words.

"She broke up with me," I finally murmured. Those five words were daggers stabbing at my heart. It felt official, more real to voice those words out loud. Because I was not only admitting those words to someone else, but also admitting them to myself.

His hand stopped moving as he inhaled a sharp breath. "Elise broke up with you?" he whispered weakly.

I nodded against his neck. I refused to let the tears fall again. I was so emotionally drained at the moment that I feared producing more tears would make me light-headed and faint.

"But why? You two seemed so happy," he asked slowly. I heard the hesitance in his tone, as if he was afraid of asking for fear that he would cause me to break down again. I raised my head and met his eyes, which were not only filled with concern, but also with confusion. "I didn't know you two were having problems."

I drew in a deep breath before attempting to talk again. But I didn't talk. I ended up spitting out my words like venom instead. "She fucked me and dumped me," I mustered the very last strands of my anger and threw it into those words before I practically collapsed on Phil, too weak to hold him firmly now. I let my head fall onto his shoulder again. "I'm obviously not good enough."

"Don't say that," he scolded sternly. I just shrugged half-heartedly in response. "Dan, look at me." I didn't answer, and he huffed in annoyance as I blatantly ignored him. He started shifting and pushing at my shoulders, trying to create some distance between us again. I groaned, irritated.

"What now?" I grumbled as he practically shoved me off his lap.

"Turn around, I want to hold you better," he replied. I blew out an exasperated sigh but complied, too exhausted to argue.

His arms wrapped around my waist and pulled me into him, my back gently hitting his chest with a small thump. As he rested his chin on my shoulder, I quickly came to the conclusion that I _hated_ this position. My face still had steaks of tears, still sported a disgusting red shade, still exuded vulnerability from every crevice. And now I couldn't hide it in his neck. In this broken state, I couldn't conceal any emotions appearing on my face even if I wanted to. My face was visible and open for him to read now.

I avoided his eyes as I resolutely stared off into the woods.

"Dan?"

I still didn't turn to look at him when he spoke. He had already heard the vulnerability in my voice and had felt it when my tears dropped onto his neck. He didn't need to see it written all over my face too. "Yeah?"

"Don't say you're not good enough. That's not true," he insisted while keeping his gaze on the woods as well.

"That's bullshit," I snapped at him. "If I were good enough, funny enough, attractive enough, enjoyable enough, then she would have never left me for someone who is better than me in every way." Although I didn't know _who_ Elise had left me for, I assumed that the guy had everything that I lacked. Or else she would have never suggested "broadening our experiences".

" _Dan_ ," he tried again. "Dan, don't say that. There's nothing wrong with you. And Elise... Dan, Elise isn't the only girl in the world."

I whipped my head around to glare at him, causing whatever words that were about to tumble out of his mouth to vanish. He gulped nervously at my glower. A muscle twitched involuntarily at the corner of his left eye as a result of his uneasiness.

"Elise," I started with mock patience, drawing out each word slowly and coldly as if explaining something trivial to a child, "was the only girl in my world."

He answered my bitter words with silence. This thick and unresponsive quietness would normally fill me with anxiety and panic, especially on a pitch-black night devoid of the familiar soft wind to rustle the leaves and caress my skin. But tonight, I accepted the silence. It acted as a salve – Hell, this silence was stronger than any medicine. Because _this_ was calming me down and reducing the pain into a dull throb. _This_ was all I needed right now: being in Phil's arms without any words to distract and hinder the healing of the punctured hole in my heart.

But as seconds morphed into minutes, his need to comfort me grew. And I should have known better than assume that he would let me sit here in undisturbed silence. Because this was _Phil_ , the boy that would do anything to make someone feel better. I still remembered when he had kissed me two years ago, claiming it was some "cheer up charm", just so I was distracted enough from my distress to stop crying. But from that stupid moment onwards, I quickly grew to realise that he would truly do or say any ridiculous thing to make my tears dry up faster and help lift the corners of my frown.

He ended up resting his cheek on my shoulder. "You're good enough for me," he whispered softly. "Does that...mean anything to you?"

I felt the corners of my lips dip lower, deepening my frown. Curse his damn words, my heart started to ache again. That punctured hole wasn't ever going to heal if he started to sound so small and hopeless. And I would have felt angrier if this weren't Phil. Because this shouldn't be about _him_ , what I thought about _him_ , right now. This should be about me feeling sad and having the right to bitch and complain about Elise leaving me.

I turned my head and looked at him on my shoulder. "Of course that means something to me, Phil," I hesitantly assured. I felt as if our roles had somehow switched. Why was I reassuring Phil? I thought he was supposed to be comforting _me_ tonight.

He lifted his face and placed his hand on the back of my head. His eyes locked with mine, and if it weren't for the hand restraining my head from moving, I would've turned away from his intense gaze by now.

He shook his head slowly. "You're good enough for me, Dan," he repeated earnestly. "You're the best friend that I could ever have. And I don't know how much you want to hear it right now, because you're going to think that I'm lying to you. But you _are_ funny, nice, enjoyable, caring. Elise didn't leave you because she thought you're not good enough, because you're more than enough. She'll be missing you soon, because she'll realise what a damn _mistake_ it was to leave you."

I gaped at him, flabbergasted by the sincerity and passion painting his tone. That hole in my heart seemed incredibly insignificant right now, because I felt like all the blood was rushing there and threatening to burst from his affection. And although I knew I was going to be bitter and miserable about Elise leaving me for a long time, at this moment Phil's words overshadowed my previous woes of heartbreak, making me feel lightheaded and happy instead.

I offered him a small smile as his hand dropped its hold from the back of my head. My head tilted back and rested on his shoulder before I mumbled, "Love you, Phil."

I watched as his lips parted and his eyes widened in surprise, but it slowly morphed into pure, unrestrained happiness. He seemed like the brightest thing in the pitch-black night at the moment, with the moonlight illuminating his skin and his huge smile lighting up his face.

He tightened his grip on my waist and ducked his head under my chin before whispering, "Love you too, Dan."

I bit my lip to restrain the embarrassingly large smile from occupying my face. It felt so...nice and reassuring to hear those words from someone you genuinely cared about. Although my parents constantly showered me with those words, they were my parents, and it was their job to love me. A job that Phil's parents completely disregarded.

But when you heard the words from someone else whose job wasn't to love and care for you, but telling you that they did anyways, it was an indescribable feeling. And to be honest, I would have never suspected that the expressionless fourteen-year-old, who had at first offended me by occupying my hideout spot, would have become the brightest person in my world.

I practically forgot about Elise. I forgot why I was here in Phil's arm in the middle of the night in the first place. All I could think about was _Phil_.

Our friendship was quite funny, really, because we were such an unlikely pair. I was a loud, foulmouthed, dark-humoured, sarcastic twat. Phil was quiet, polite, charming and warm. But when it came to our personalities, we were aligned in ways that I didn't think either of us really understood. We were quite an unlikely pair, Phil and I, but we worked so well together.

I willed for the embarrassing happiness to disappear. "We literally need to stop being two soppy, disgusting teenage _girls_ ," I complained as I started to shift against him.

He loosened his grip and watched me as I crawled out of his embrace so I could sit in front of him instead. "Let me be a soppy teenage girl tonight," he groaned irritatingly. His fake crossness quickly vanished as a blush coloured his cheeks. Phil dropped his gaze to his lap. "No one really tells me that...that they love me. I mean, well, Martyn does in his emails, but he never really calls, because he can't call that much, because international calls are so expensive for him. But when he does call, he tells me that he loves me, but he only calls a couple times a year. So I never really hear anyone telling me that too often, and you didn't have to –"

" _Phil,"_ I cut off his nervous rambling. He bit his lip and looked at me shyly through his eyelashes.

I threw my arms around him again and heard him sigh contently as his arms returned around me. "Thanks for being here for me, Phil," I murmured quietly. "Thank you so much."

He hummed in response before tucking his head into the back of my neck. I shivered as the cold metal of his glasses grazed my skin. After a moment of silence, he whispered, "I thought you said we needed to stop being soppy girls."

"This is obviously a very important moment in our friendship," I grumbled. "Don't ruin it."

But he seemed adamant on ruining the moment anyways, as he dropped his arms and moved away from me. I sighed as he took out his phone, the dim blue light emanating from the screen.

"Dan, it's almost two-twenty," he murmured.

"Then stay over at my place?"

He nodded and got up, tugging my outstretched hands to pull me up onto my feet as well. He giggled as I stumbled into him, making me shove him and hurry past him, which caused him to run to keep up with my fast pace.

We silently entered my house, hoping not to wake up my parents. They didn't care if Phil came into our house during the dead of night, but they would definitely scream and shout if they discovered _me_ walking into the house at two in the morning.

I remembered the rainy day when Phil had told me about his family two years ago, curled up next to me, even on top of me, as he failed to keep the tears from falling and his voice from trembling. Small, sad, miserable _Phil_ who had the only family member that he loved ripped away from his life.

When I went home afterwards that day, I had asked my parents if we could give Phil an extra key to the house so he could come here when he was having "family issues". But they had been hesitant.

"Many people have family problems," they had gently informed me. "And Phil is an amazing boy. But Dan, you have to understand that we can't just give him free access to our house like that whenever he wants to escape his home. We could get in trouble with his family."

But their reluctance gradually transformed into shock and sympathy after I had explained Phil's situation in detail. As parents, they had been even more appalled and disturbed by the fact that Phil's parents had abandoned their oldest son in another country without a second thought only because Martyn wanted to pursue his dreams.

They had agreed to give Phil a key to our house, and over the years they didn't even bat an eye when he randomly entered our house without warning or when they discovered him sleeping in my bed in the mornings.

Phil and I quickly changed into comfortable clothing before plopping onto my bed together. I watched as he grabbed a pillow to hold onto for when he would be sleeping. I bit the inside of my cheek as he murmured a soft "Good night" before turning over and clutching onto the pillow.

I didn't reply with a "Good night" as I stared at the back of his head. I hugged myself and resisted the urge to tremble. I felt empty and devoid of warmth and affection. My girlfriend of over thirteen months had left me tonight, and now I was supposed to fall asleep with no one to hold onto, or with no one to hold onto me and look forward to wake up with _me_ in the morning.

Was she _happy_ that she finally got me out of her life? That she finally didn't have to pretend to care for me anymore? She was probably ecstatic that she could finally fall asleep with the man who she truly wanted. I squeezed my eyes tightly as I willed for the impending fury from bubbling once more. I had finally calmed down with Phil's help, and it would take me forever to extinguish my incensed fire again.

I was probably a heavy bag that was too difficult to hoist over a shoulder, that needed to be lifted to prevent it from dragging along the ground. Every now and then, the person carrying the bag had to stop, place it on the ground, and switch to the other hand to continue carrying the bag before it also got tired.

Was she _happy_ that she finally left the heavy bag on the pavement? That she didn't have to spend unnecessary energy to constantly lift it off the ground? That she finally didn't have to carry extra unwanted weight with her? Was that what I was, a fucking burden who ultimately drained her of the energy to care for me?

At the lack of my response, Phil looked back to find me chewing on the inside of my cheek nervously while fidgeting with the sheets. He spun around to fully face me and plopped himself on an elbow. "What's wrong?"

A blush seared through my cheeks and for a solid minute I was convinced that my face was on fire. I suddenly felt awkward and bashful, even going as far as attempting to hide my embarrassed rosiness behind my hands. When I peeked at him through my fingers, I wasn't surprised to discover a puzzled look loitering on his face.

"I was wondering if you could hold me," I mumbled into my hands, feeling the temperature in my cheeks rise higher.

He furrowed his eyebrows in puzzlement. "Sorry, what did you say? I didn't quite catch that."

I dropped my hands from my face while also dropping my gaze to the blanket. "Wondering if you could hold me tonight," I repeated, restraining the need to cringe at the palpable embarrassment colouring my tone.

I didn't look up when my request was met with silence. And of course, that response wasn't surprising either. Although we still constantly hugged each other more than necessary, we haven't held each other while we _slept_ in a long time. Because after Elise and I had started dating, she was the only person I had wanted in my arms while I slept. And Phil had understood and respected that, even _laughed_ at my discomfort when I requested for him to stop holding me and suggested that he should "hold onto one of my pillows or something instead".

But tonight, I didn't have Elise. And tonight, I wanted Elise as far away from my mind as possible. Tonight, I wanted to revert back to before we had started dating. And reverting back meant letting Phil back in again.

His voice broke my thoughts. "Yeah, Dan, come here." He shifted on the bed as his arms opened wide in invitation, but his encouraging smile faltered when I didn't move. "Do you want me to come to you then? You don't have to be embarrassed about this, you know. It's only me and we literally hug all the time anyway."

I hesitated before shaking my head. "No, it's okay, just let me..." I trailed off as I shuffled towards him, sighing contently against his neck as his arms wrapped around me.

My mind tried to rationalize tonight's events to lessen the pain. So what did it matter that I didn't have Elise tonight? I was falling asleep in the arms of someone who actually cared for me and made me the happiest anyways.

I softly huffed out a breath and closed my eyes, trying to convince sleepiness to overcome me. I would describe falling asleep like being situated on a Ferris wheel of thoughts. Every event from today started to replay in my mind, demanding analysis and thorough examination before being allowed to sleep. And when the Ferris wheel finally came to a stop, it was a moment when my mind had the opportunity to wander freely in random ideas that were the precursors of sleep. But then I would realise that I was close to dozing off and my anxiety would start the Ferris wheel up once more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, and thank you for your lovely comments! <3  
> Sorry this chapter was kind of short and uneventful, although next chapter will be pretty long hopefully. It's also a gamechanger. Love, you say? Nah bruh it's gonna be angstyyy.
> 
>  **ALSO** a heads up: I will _not_ be updating next week. I'm sorry about this! I've just been so incredibly busy with schoolwork and activities and life, and my beta will also be pretty busy next week too. Chapter Nine will be up the following week though. :)
> 
> Thank you, lovelies!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back! I'm sorry it's been so long since the last update (I've been so so so busy irl!) although here's a new chapter, hope you all enjoy <3

An irritating noise blared deafeningly from my phone and pierced into my dreams, forcing my eyes to fly open and making me extremely cranky. I heard Phil’s annoyed groan from behind me and felt his hold on me vanish.

“Fucking _hell_ ,” I muttered as I jerked up to snatch the phone from my bedside table to answer it. My irritation grew even further when I saw who was calling me. “PJ, what the hell?” I grunted frustratingly as I fell back on the bed next to Phil, who had now placed a pillow over his face. “Do you know what time it is?”

“Do _you_ know what time it is?” PJ countered. “It’s _ten_ , Dan.”

“I can’t deal with you this early in the morning,” I grumbled, generating a disbelieving snort from the other end. “What do you want?”

“I’m actually walking over to your place right now, whether you like it or not. Thought it’d be nice to give you a heads up.”

I started to rub my eyes in attempts to get rid of the sleep. “I don’t want to see your stupid face right now,” I complained.

He chuckled, and I could practically visualise him shaking his head in amusement. “Too bad.”

I opened my mouth to argue and insult him but, before I could, he hung up and let silence replace his voice instead.

“PJ, you little shit,” I mumbled into the phone, even though I knew he couldn’t hear me anymore. I set my phone back onto the table, rolled onto my stomach to bury my face into the pillows, and let out a frustrated noise.

“PJ’s coming over?”

I raised my head to look at Phil, who had now lowered the pillow from his confused-ridden face. I nodded in response and went back to hiding my own face in the pillows.

He started to repetitively poke my shoulders, causing me to huff indignantly and slap his hand away. “ _Dan,_ ” he whined as he began to push my sides to get me to roll over on my back. “Shouldn’t we get up now?”

“No,” I grumbled into the pillow. “So stop bothering me.”

However, he was a persistent bastard who obviously wanted it his way this morning without any arguments or complaints. He ignored me as he began _shoving_ my sides and shoulders in order to get me to move.

“Ugh, _Phil_ ,” I groaned as I finally rolled over on my back to stop his actions. He flashed me an encouraging grin and started tugging at my hands so we could go downstairs for breakfast. But I couldn’t deal with his overwhelming positivity and stubbornness this morning. “I am _literally_ about to kick your stomach if you don’t stop trying to rip my arms out of my sockets,” I threatened.

He rolled his eyes at me but stopped tugging my arms. “So you’re just going to lay in bed for the rest of the day?”

A sardonic grin twisted my lips and I winked at him. “See, you know me so well.”

His shoulders slumped and he blew his fringe out of his eyes in frustration. “Suit yourself.”

I sighed in relief and closed my eyes to doze off again. Phil didn’t know that I had fallen asleep hours after he did, as my mind had kept replaying all the memories that I had shared with Elise and resurfacing my emotions of heartbreak and misery. I had finally drifted off with tears trickling down my face again, and my quiet, erratic gulps of air not synchronized with Phil’s rhythmic breathing. All I could think about was whether she was happy with the guy she could now have. Whether she was happy that she didn’t need to waste her energy on me. Whether she was comparing me to him the way that I had been all night.

I heard the soft rustles of bedsheets and small movements that were making the bed bounce slightly, but I was too tired to acknowledge them. It was the weekend, and surely I shouldn’t be getting such little sleep on a free day.

All of a sudden, a weight fell on my hips and my eyes irritably fluttered open to observe the offending object. However, it wasn’t an object; it was the stubborn little fuck who was making my morning way more difficult than it needed to be. Phil was just _sat_ on my hips lazily while nonchalantly scrolling through his phone.

“What do you want now?” I snapped at him irritably. “ _You_ can go downstairs and get breakfast, just let me sleep in peace.”

He barely looked up from his phone to acknowledge me. “I’m just helping you out,” he replied brightly, although sarcasm was dripping from every word. “As you’re going to lay in bed all day, I’m just _assisting_ you with that and _ensuring_ that you really don’t get off the bed.”

As I was running on three hours of sleep, I couldn’t deal with stupid jokes and sarcastic teasing right now. “I swear on your mum’s life,” I dragged out my words darkly, “that if you don’t get off of me _right now_ , I will literally punch you in the face.”

He chuckled and amusement lit up in his eyes. Oh my god, why was he entertained, I wasn’t _joking_ here. “And you know that you sitting on my hips is not something that’s…socially acceptable,” I continued, knowing that the “socially acceptable” comment was going to push his buttons. He absolutely hated being reminded of what society deemed as “normal” for one to fit in, always huffing and complaining something incredibly childish along the lines of “No one is normal!”

The amusement in his eyes dimmed a bit at my mention of social acceptance. “Who,” he started as he gestured his hand to the unpopulated room, “is here right now to judge whether something is _socially acceptable_?” While my mind was trying to formulate a clever response, he scoffed before returning his attention to his phone. “And I’m not going to start riding you, if _that’s_ what your stupid morning brain is worried about,” he deadpanned.

It wasn’t shocking that I didn’t immediately process the meaning behind his vocabulary, especially when it spilled out so unexpectedly and casually from the mouth of the most well-mannered and polite person I knew. The implication hit me similar to how a snowball rolls down from a hill: small and slow at first, then huge and barrelling into you all at once.

I sputtered, completely forgetting how to breathe and too stunned to speak. The boy rarely ever _swore_ , yet now Phil actually went as far as uttering an innuendo in the midst of being agitated with me. My eyes were as wide as they could be and my mouth kept opening and closing, similar to a fish out of water.

Phil finally looked up for longer than three seconds, surely because he felt my disbelief practically radiating off of me. Embarrassment was visible on his features, but amusement – and what the fuck, was that _pride_ on his face? – was overshadowing the shame. His hand flew over his mouth to muffle his laughter when he saw the astonishment and alarm on my face, but the laughter was still loud in the brightness in his eyes and cheeks.

I tried to compose myself and sat up with Phil still giggling on my lap. “Who are you,” I slowly enquired while attempting to look serious and trying to stop the corners of my lips from twitching upwards, “and what have you done with Phil Lester?”

His laughter melted into a wide grin, and he pretended to appear shy as he peered at me through his messy fringe. “I’ve been spending more time with Chris lately,” he teased. “What, I can’t say anything like that while everyone else can?”

He pouted his lips when I vigorously shook my head. “No, definitely not,” I insisted. “It’s too weird when you say things like that. You’re too…not crude. You’re too polite.”

“That hardly seems fair,” he complained. He leaned forward with that stupid smirk still planted on his lips. “Maybe I don’t want to be ‘too polite’ anymore.”

I rolled my eyes at his attempt to appear mischievous. If he didn’t stop now, whatever he was going to do or say next was surely going to make me cringe at his awkward boldness. I couldn’t take him seriously when he was trying to be suggestive; it didn’t mix well with his personality. “Wow, we got a badass over here,” I gasped sarcastically. “Kill your fantasy, you’re always going to be known as ‘too polite’. You’re not going through a personality change any time soon when you’re still trying to pet squirrels at parks.”

He leaned back and huffed out a frustrated breath. “Fine, I’ll just hang out with Chris. At least he’ll support and encourage me while I’m trying to explore another side of me.”

I knew he meant that as a joke – Hell, the sarcasm and teasing tone were so blatantly obvious and clear that they were practically oozing out of his words. But, despite my understanding that he was joking, I flinched and looked away. It was way too soon for him to be saying things like that, to practically tell me that he would leave me for someone else because they had something to offer that I didn’t have.

Phil’s playful demeanour quickly vanished when he witnessed my face falling. He placed one hand on my shoulder while lifting my chin up to meet his eyes with the other. “I didn’t mean that,” he insisted softly while his eyes were worriedly searching mine to check how much damage his rashness had caused me. “I’m sorry, that was insensitive of me.”

I offered him a weak smile before shrugging in attempts to appear casual. I didn’t want Phil to think that I was sensitive to the point where he couldn’t even joke with me without constantly having to tiptoe on ice for fear of breaking me. I couldn’t appear so vulnerable and insecure that, instead of acting normal around me, he would have to treat me like a child who regularly needed to be taken care of.

“It’s fine,” I reassured, forcing my smile to morph into a wide grin in order to prove my words.

He bit his lip as uncertainty flooded his face. He obviously didn’t believe me, and under his worried gaze I grew increasingly frustrated with myself for being so blatantly insecure and sensitive. Although last night was filled with tears and sobs drenched with my vulnerability and frustrations, it was just as bad when my normal mood was reverted back to my depressing emotions. Because now it meant that even if everything seemed normal, just a couple careless words could push me back into that dark abyss of extreme emotions.

He seemed as if he wanted to say something, but I interrupted him before he could. “I’m _fine_ , Phil,” I repeated with more conviction. “Really, don’t worry about me.”

Although he still appeared uncertain, he thankfully chose not to try exploring my inner turmoil further. He nodded with a smile on his face and opened his mouth again. But before words could spill out from his mouth, a loud knock resonated through my door, which was quickly followed by the door swinging open.

“Dan! Your mother doesn’t even know that you’re up and it’s almost half ten –”

Phil and I both whipped our heads around to the source of PJ’s voice, who was now standing at my doorway with an amused look on his face as his eyes landed on us.

Before I could process what was happening, Phil violently shoved me onto the bed and scrambled off of me with such a speed that his rapid movements were a massive blur of colours. His hurriedness caused my head to roughly hit the bed’s headboard and PJ to double over in laughter at my pain.

“Oh my god,” I hissed as my hand flew to touch the now tender spot. “I have never seen you move that fast before.”

A red-faced Phil ignored me as he frantically carded his hand through his hair while keeping his eyes trained on PJ instead, who was snickering as he made his way into my room. However, PJ’s snickers reduced into a fond smile when Phil broke off his gaze to look at anything else in the room except PJ and me.

PJ sat on the edge of the bed next to Phil and nudged his side. “Hey, I wasn’t going to assume anything,” PJ told him gently. “What a dick I’d be if I did. You and Dan are best friends, anyways. You don’t have to act any different around him just because he’s a guy.”

I sat up, puzzled as I watched PJ address – reassure? – Phil. My confusion only grew when Phil bashfully held PJ’s encouraging gaze before dropping his eyes to his lap.

“Louise is one of my best friends, and the girl has seen me _naked_ before,” PJ continued, causing Phil to chuckle nervously. “Though we both know that doesn’t mean anything. She’s like a sister to me. Just like how Dan’s a brother to you.”

“I keep hearing my name and I don’t know what’s going on,” I muttered.

My voice seemed to trigger something in Phil, because he jumped off the bed and stood up so fast that he would’ve lost his balance if PJ didn’t reach out and grab his wrists to steady him. Phil gave him a small smile of gratitude before allowing PJ to drop his hands.

“Are you alright, Phil?” I asked, cocking my head slightly. He hadn’t acted this jittery last night. In fact, the last time he had acted this nervous was…

Shit.

What kind of shitty friend was I? I had completely neglected that, just yesterday, Phil had come to pull me aside during lunchtime to reveal something that had been bothering him for weeks. And instead of encouraging him to confide those problems with me last night, I had selfishly dumped my own personal troubles without giving him a chance to do the same. He had bottled up those problems and pushed them aside in order to cheer me up, when I should’ve reciprocated by comforting him as well.

“I’m fine,” Phil echoed my words with the same false conviction from earlier. “I’m going home, but can I…see you later, Dan?” His eyes darted over to PJ again and he visibly relaxed when PJ gave him an encouraging smile.

“Yeah, text me when you want to see me,” I answered with a smile as well, hoping he would relax at the sight of my weak attempts of appearing reassuring.

Before I could do or say anything else to make an effort to reduce his edginess, he quickly murmured a goodbye before practically _bolting_ out of my bedroom.

I stared dumbfounded at the door that had allowed Phil to escape.

“What just happened?” I mumbled, finally acknowledging PJ’s presence directly.

A light chuckle escaped from PJ’s lips and he shook his head in amusement. “You know Phil’s shit at hiding his emotions. When he’s feeling something, you can’t help but feel it too.”

“But what was he _nervous_ about?”

He offered me an apologetic smile and shrugged his shoulders, which caused me to scowl. “Don’t act so innocent,” I accused. “You know exactly what’s going on with him. Why isn’t he telling me about it?”

“He was going to yesterday,” he explained. “But you were at Elise’s place after school, so he came to talk to me about it instead.”

I wanted to throw a fit in infuriation at the incredibly vague descriptions I was receiving about Phil’s dilemma. “But what _is_ it?” I whined. “You two are making it seem like it’s a huge deal.”

He threw me a sympathetic look and shook his head again. “Not my place to say, trust me,” he promised, much to my irritation. “But I didn’t come here to talk about Phil – I didn’t even know he was here in the first place. I came to check up on _you_.”

I blinked. “What for?” I asked stupidly.

He raised his eyebrows and tilted his head. “About the…incident with you and Elise?”

Realisation quickly flooded my mind, and I was drowning all over again at the reminder of yesterday’s event. The absolute _last_ thing I wanted to do was even _think_ about my breakup.

I averted my gaze to the wall instead. “I don’t wanna talk about that,” I murmured weakly, shaking my head as if it would help shake away his concern as well.

I felt the bed bounce slightly, and I assumed that he was shifting towards me. My suspicions were confirmed when his arm draped around my shoulders and pulled me closer to him. My leg was tightly pressed next to his, but I didn’t move away. Instead, I relaxed into his hold and moved closer to him to rest my head on his shoulder.

“I’m so sorry, Dan,” I heard him whisper. I shrugged my shoulders in response. He thankfully didn’t ask me any more questions about the breakup. I truly wanted that stupid event to be the farthest thing from my mind. It was emotionally draining to even think about.

However, confusion slowly took over my exhaustion. I removed my head from his shoulder and looked up. “How did you know?” I asked. “I didn’t tell anyone yet except Phil.”

A sheepish expression spread across his face and he withdrew his arm from my shoulders to scratch the back of his neck. “Well, Elise told Zoe,” he started to explain with a guilty blush. “And Zoe told Joe, who told Caspar, who told Chris, who told me.”

The fact that my friends were already informed of my breakup – before I was even ready for them to be – only helped fuel my frustration. I ducked my head into my hands and groaned.

“I can’t believe this,” I muttered crossly into my hands.

I felt a light squeeze on my shoulder before hands tried to pry my own ones away from my face. I glanced up at PJ and was met with familiar green eyes glazed with guilt and sympathy.

My mind began to tune out whatever words PJ was now voicing. My eyes travelled across his face, taking in the golden tone of his skin, the sharpness of his jaw, the softness in his stunning green eyes, the locks of brown curls falling across his forehead. I’ve witnessed this face change and develop for ten years, yet I still remained overwhelmed by how angular and attractively carved it was.

Insecurity started to sneak into my mind again. Why would Elise want to stay with me when she could have someone who was so much more attractive than I was?

I didn’t realise that PJ had stopped talking until he began to wave a hand in front of my face. “Dan?” His voice continued to repeat my name, which finally caused me to blink rapidly and break away from my thoughts.

“She left me for someone else,” I finally mumbled. “Someone who’s probably better than me in every way.”

He began to shift uncomfortably next to me. “Well, to be fair, the guy isn’t too different from you.”

I inhaled sharply and snapped my head around to look at him again. “You know who it is?” The pity coating his face was my confirmation. “Who _is_ it?” I demanded.

He sighed and shook his head again. “You have to hear that from her,” he advised, causing me to groan in exasperation. “It’ll only be fair.”

“You’re so annoying sometimes, you know that?” I muttered crankily.

He chuckled and leaned over to kiss my temple. “I know,” he apologised. “I’m only trying to be fair.”

I rolled my eyes and got off of the bed to head for my wardrobe, ignoring the sounds of the footsteps trailing behind me. PJ raised an eyebrow as I stripped out of my pyjamas to put on uncomfortably tight skinny jeans and a black jumper.

“You’re not going to Elise’s place right _now_ , are you?” he heaved a tired sigh. “You just woke up.”

“Yeah, I am,” I replied curtly. “Because _you’re_ too busy being Jesus and trying to be ‘fair’ by not telling me anything. There are times when I’ve wondered how you managed to stick with me and my emotions for a decade, and then there are times when I’ve wondered how I’m still stuck with such an annoyingly good person.”

\- x -

Three knocks. My knuckles ached as they had just finished rapping roughly on her door.

I ignored the pain as I anxiously drummed my fingers on my thigh while waiting for the door to swing open.

The impatience possessed me to not having the ability to stay still. I mindlessly started to pace back and forth while my mind was engulfed in anxiety. What happened if her parents or sister opened the door instead of her? I truly didn’t want to see her family – I’d feel too guilty facing her parents, especially when they have treated me as their son for an entire year. What happened if she opened the door? Do I just bombard her with questions and then leave?

My fingers got bored from its tapping movements and instead resorted to fidget with my jumper. Although it hadn’t even been thirty seconds since I’d knocked on the door, each second felt like a long minute passing.

The door finally creaked. It didn’t dramatically swing open as I had expected it to be, instead hesitantly budged ajar. My eyes snapped up and were greeted with Elise slowly coming outside and shutting the door behind her.

I was taken aback at her appearance. I was expecting a relaxed face glowing with happiness and satisfaction, eyes bright but dimming when they had landed on me, as I was the obvious hindrance and weight to her shoulders.

However, her appearance was the complete opposite. Her dim eyes lit up slightly at the sight of me. She had dark circles under her bloodshot eyes and exhaustion was visible on every crevice of her face. Her usually neat hair was now a greasy bird’s nest.

“You look terrible,” I blurted out quietly. The anger and misery that had captured my emotions for the past twelve hours vanished at the pitiful sight of the girl who normally never failed to evoke a smile from someone’s lips. I wasn’t so much of a heartless person that I would find pleasure in someone else’s pain, no matter how much agony and heartache they had granted me.

A short chuckle that didn’t contain any humour tumbled out of her lips. “Thanks,” she mumbled. Her voice was hollow, appropriately accompanying the absence of emotion on her face. She looked completely drained of energy, just like I had felt following our breakup.

Silence blanketed us as we warily observed each other, trying to identify the toll the event from last night had taken on the other. However, the silent stretched for so long that discomfort and uneasiness began to seep into the air.

I broke the muted atmosphere by awkwardly clearing my throat. This seemed to trigger her mouth to speak. And when she started talking, she couldn’t stop.

“Dan, I’m so sorry! You’re one of the nicest person in the world and I can’t believe myself for using you last night. I didn’t want to end things the way that they did, and I’m so sorry about everything! You were such a big part of my life and…”

I began to tune out her babbling when I didn’t hear what I wanted to hear. I wanted to hear her tell me that she wanted me back. I wanted her to tell me it was all a mistake. But all I heard was her lamenting that she regretted _how_ we broke up, that it was so sudden and how she didn’t want to end our relationship the way that it did.

I raised my hand. “Save it, Elise.” I hoped my voice wasn’t noticeably shaky. I took a deep breath before continuing. “All I want to know is who the guy is. I believe that is a fair request.” I tried not to wince at how formal I’d sounded.

She bit her lip nervously, but eventually exhaled a trembling breath. “You can’t be mad at him, though,” she pleaded. “It really isn’t his fault. I don’t think he even knows that I…”

“Just tell me who it is, Elise.” I heaved an exhausted sigh.

Each second of silence was equivalent to an hour as I impatiently waited for a name to fall from her lips. However, when a face was finally placed on the mysterious man, I was convinced that time stopped. My body went rigid while my mind was anything but, as it was dizzy with the rapid influx of thoughts and emotions.

A powerful wave of betrayal and disbelief washed over me, and my wobbly knees had to physically fight against the heavy flood in order to not drop to the ground.

I swiftly spun around and sprinted to the forest, ignoring Elise’s pleas to not be mad at him.

Oh, I was going to destroy Phil.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I _know_ I said that this chapter was going to be angsty and what-not, and I swear I had planned for it to be, but I kind of suck? It's just that I write way too much without meaning to, and before I knew it I had written 4K+ words, and if I added the angst the chapter would've been way too long for my liking. (It'll be in the next chapter, promise. ;D)


	10. Chapter 10

I didn’t know what to do.

I felt like I had to make an extra effort, an incredibly _strenuous_ effort, to be mad at Phil. I had already decided a few years ago that I couldn’t conjure any negative emotions towards him. However, I had decided that when he had tears welling in his large, blue orbs. I had decided that when we were cuddling. I had decided that when I was _fourteen._

I wanted to be mad at him. I had every right to be. How the hell could I overlook the fact that my best friend basically stole my girlfriend from me? I honestly couldn’t continue treating him like he was a child. Hell, with the mentality that I had when I was fourteen, he could have committed murder and I still wouldn’t have been too appalled by him.

I had every right to yell at him now. Or at least, this was how I was desperately trying to convince myself. I squeezed my eyes tightly shut as I hurried to the forest, begging my mind to find something, _anything_ , to support and help strengthen my outrage for him. I needed to show him that I was angry with him. Because _this_ had crossed a line, and he couldn’t get away with it and believe that I was okay.

However, my mind decided to overachieve today – to a degree I wasn’t prepared for. I truly wasn’t prepared for the tremendous _influx_ of suggestions promoting the idea of Elise being romantically involved with Phil.

_“Maybe Elise is cheating on Dan and shagging Phil in secret,” Chris exclaimed cheekily._

_“I’ve been spending more time with Chris lately,” Phil teased. “At least he’ll support and encourage me while I’m trying to explore another side of me.”_

I clenched my fists and gritted my teeth. I wasn’t even comprehending how fast my legs were moving. All I knew was that my mind was racing.

_“Where’s Phil and Elise? They’ve both been acting really weird lately.” PJ turned to offer me a sympathetic look. “Especially when they’re around Dan.”_

_“She left me for someone else,” I mumbled. “Someone who’s probably better than me in every way.”_

_“Well, to be fair,” PJ started to explain uncomfortably, “the guy isn’t too different from you.”_

I stumbled into our empty hideout, wanting to flick a switch to turn off the Sun’s blaring brightness. How dare the Sun provide the world with such a beautiful canopy of light and pretend that everything was perfectly fine and cheery?

_“I need to tell you something, Dan,” Phil quivered. “I just hope…you don’t judge me because of it. And that you’ll still be my friend?”_

Every conversation that suggested Phil was involved with Elise began to fuel a fire inside of me. Every memory correlating to it created toxic fumes to suffocate me with, harming me from the inside out until I couldn’t breathe properly. I completely forgot about my belief that I could never be mad at Phil – but I wasn’t mad at him; I was _furious._ He was one of the most important people in my world, and I couldn’t _believe_ he would go behind my back and do something like this to me.

_“All I want to know is who the guy is,” I requested shakily._

_There was a moment of verbal silence, but hesitance and apprehension and uncomfortable tension were loud in the air._

_Then a name, disguised as a bomb, dropped from her lips, detonating and shattering me. I could have sworn that the world was on fire. I just saw red._

_“Phil.”_

My knees buckled and dropped to the grass. My hands flew to my mouth to muffle my frustrated yells. I wanted to release my anger and annihilate the emotions of betrayal that were capturing my body. I needed to spew my emotions into space like how a volcano violently emitted its fire into the darkness.

My hand whipped out my phone so quickly that the object almost flew out of my grasp and hurled into a tree.

 ** **To Phil:**** Forest. Now.

The phone slipped from my hand shortly after the text was delivered, and I didn’t even concern myself with the terrifyingly loud thud that it made as soon as it hit the ground. I curled up into a ball, bringing my knees up into my chest and wrapping my arms around my legs, and rested my forehead on my knees while I mindlessly rocked back and forth.

I didn’t know what hurt more: my girlfriend leaving me for someone else, or my best friend comforting me through my breakup while knowing that _he_ was the reason behind the separation in the first place.

All I knew was that I felt betrayal.

I’d rather he slapped me across the face – at least _that_ pain would be temporary. I’d rather have an agonising stinging sensation spreading across my skin than have him comforting me with lies.

It wasn’t long until I heard the sounds of leaves crunching and twigs snapping. The footsteps got louder, _he_ got closer, but I didn’t lift my head up just yet. My arms hugged my legs tighter, protecting myself for a couple more seconds before I chose to get up, yank out answers from him, and allow myself to get hurt.

“Dan?” Phil’s voice was laced with concern, which was normally warm and comforting to me. However, now it was a nuisance. It was the last noise I wanted to hear. His voice engulfed me, completely ensnaring my mind and rendering any logical thought or conclusion impossible.

I slowly raised my head to reluctantly regard the face in front of me. The familiar blue eyes were wide with worry, which only helped to power my aggravation for him. How _dare_ he pretend to be concerned for me? Had he merely been using me so he could have a place to stay when he wanted to escape his home?

He placed his hand on my shoulder, an action that usually allowed comfort to flow into me. But not today. Now it felt like spikes were piercing into me, hurting and stinging and puncturing. I roughly slapped his hand away.

“Don’t touch me,” I hissed. He inhaled a sharp breath and hastily withdrew his hand. His eyes widened with shock. He took a step back as I stood up while striving to maintain the unforgivingly harsh expression on my face.

He seemed absolutely bewildered and stunned. It wasn’t an unanticipated reaction – he had never seen me deliver such a bitter and hostile glare at him before.

I took a step towards him, and he took a step back. I squeezed my eyes shut when I saw the overwhelming worry dancing across his face. I couldn’t allow myself to falter and stand down, no matter how alarmed he appeared. I could do this. I could be angry at Phil. I couldn’t let him believe I was lenient enough to let him get away with anything and everything.

I opened my eyes and took another step towards his direction. “I can’t believe you, Phil,” I bit out. When he furrowed his eyebrows in confusion, I continued to spit out fire. “I know what’s been bothering you for weeks. You could have fancied any person in the world. But _this_ just crossed the line.”

His shock noticeably morphed into realisation, which only helped to fuel my suspicions. His jaw dropped. He continued to step back with each one I took forward, and eventually his back roughly collided with a tree. He didn’t seem to realise how harshly he had slammed against it. Instead, Phil looked as if my words were knives stabbing into his body, knocking out every wisp of air from his lungs and causing him to motionlessly stand there while struggling to inhale, exhale, or merely remember how to breathe.

“What?” he managed to gasp out. I tried to restrain myself from comforting him. He looked as if he was about to cry. Fuck, I didn’t know if I could go through with being angry with him; he was so easy to break. “I- I thought you would be supportive of me.”

I instantly forgot about my longing to console Phil as an overwhelming wave of infuriation rippled through my body and left me shaking. “Why the fuck,” I gritted out slowly, “would I be supportive of you for this?” I couldn’t believe he thought I was so weak and permissive that I would agree to support him with anything. He stole my girlfriend, robbed me of my self-confidence, and damaged my trust for him.

He was shaking as well but, unlike me, he was shaking with dread and alarm. Although Phil was slightly taller than me, he seemed so incredibly small at the moment, with him huddled against a tree while I towered over him.

“Because Chris is bise –” he stammered, but I hastily cut him off.

“I don’t give a damn if Chris supports you in all this!” I shouted, causing him to flinch. As much as I kept repeating the words “ _I’m mad at Phil, be mad at Phil”_ in my head, as much as I was clinging onto those words to anchor my fury for Phil, I couldn’t bear to look at his crestfallen and heartbroken face. I dropped my gaze and resolutely stared at our shoes while clenching my jaw tightly.

The world became mute save for Phil struggling to steady his erratic panting. The mood was so tense that the emotion almost had a physical pressure.

I heard Phil inhale a large gulp of air before slowly releasing it, his warm exhale gently hitting my face and lingering on my skin. “Dan,” he pleaded hoarsely as he reached out to caress either side of my face with both of his hands. The words I’d been repeating in my head became quiet. His hands on my cheeks were so warm, so comforting, so familiar that my mind relaxed into a calmer state as my eyes fluttered shut. He leaned in and rested his forehead against mine before whispering, “I didn’t think you would react like this, Dan. You mean so much to me, more than you can imagine. But if I make you uncomfortable now, I’ll... I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to lose you, but I don’t think I can handle staying around you when you obviously hate me because of it.”

I dug my nails into my palms to physically hold back the need to wrap my arms around him and pull him tightly into me. The calmness eclipsing my anger slowly dissipated as I forced myself to remember _why_ I was so frustrated with Phil in the first place.

Phil continued to cradle my face in one hand while his other hand travelled to rest on my shoulder. At the lack of response, he grew confident enough to keep talking. “I’m sorry this made you so uncomfortable, Dan,” he continued with a hint of pleading in his voice to persuade me to understand his perspective. “But I really thought you would… respect me enough to at least _try_ supporting me.”

I struggled to recall the source of my outraged incense for him. As his nose bumped against mine, it seemed as if the words that I’d been repeating to convince myself to stay angry at Phil were now suffocating me. The words nudged me, tugged at me, screamed at me. They reminded me that Phil was betraying me.

My hands slowly trailed to hold Phil’s while keeping my eyes trained on his face. His lips parted in surprise by how gently I was now touching him, and he compliantly allowed me to slip both my hands into his. He offered me a soft smile before realising my intentions.

I gripped his wrists and pinned his arms roughly against the tree. If his arms weren’t covered with the thick sleeves of his jumper, he surely would’ve hissed at the sharp edges of tree bark that would have been prodding uncomfortably into his skin.

His eyes widened in surprise, but the kindness in them quickly disappeared as soon as I imprisoned him between me and the tree. I almost loosened my grip in alarm when he slowly narrowed his eyes to glare at me, leaving no traces of sympathy to coat his features. A terrifyingly hollow chuckle tumbled out of his lips, a noise eerily empty of its usual amusement and brightness.

“For someone who is so adamant to hate me because of who I choose to fancy, you seem to have no problem pressing yourself up against another man’s body,” Phil quipped darkly. I recoiled at his new tone, which was no longer sweet and pleading, but blossoming with disdain.

I was too intimidated and startled to respond to Phil. His normally calm and pleasant demeanour slowly contorted with anger: his eyes flashed heatedly; his jaw clenched tightly; his eyebrows scrunched up in frustration.

I have never seen him look like that before.

Was that how I appeared to him right now?

I dropped my grip on him while maintaining our gazes, but he pursed his lips tightly and looked away. “You’re my best friend,” he muttered bitterly. “You could have at least _tried_ to support me. I wasn’t prepared for you to react _this_ badly. I wasn’t ready for you to scream at me and then throw me around like I’m some sort of pathetic _ragdoll._ I’m sorry I made you uncomfortable, I really am. But you’re being too difficult to deal with.”

Disbelief coursed through me once more. How _dare_ he make _me_ seem like the bad guy? _He_ was the one that stole Elise from me!

“Shut up,” I spat out vehemently. “Of course I would react this badly. Hell, if you were anyone else, I would have punched you in the face by now.”

He threw his hands up in exasperation. “No, you wouldn’t!” he shouted. “You haven’t punched _anyone_ in our school about it! Chris is bisexual, and that has _never_ bothered you!”

I gaped at him incredulously. “What the _hell_ does Chris’s sexuality have anything to do with this?”

His eyes snapped back to my face and he looked at me as if I were the densest person in the world. “It has _everything_ to do with what we’re talking about!”

“What are you _talking_ about?!”

The corners of his lips dipped downwards, deepening his aggravated frown. The unrestrained fury he was experiencing just a moment ago was visibly reducing from his face as he started to study me warily. “What are _you_ talking about?” he whispered cautiously.

His guarded tone caused uncertainty to seep into me. I shifted uncomfortably while biting my lip before mumbling, “You first. I asked you first.”

His shoulders sagged, but his face didn’t deflate of emotion. Instead, he seemed even more determined to tell me whatever it was that he had to say. He swiftly took my hands into his and clutched onto them tightly so I wouldn’t be able to easily break away.

When I tilted my head in question, he straightened his posture and levelly held my eyes. I have never seen him look so solemn, so determined, so earnest before.

He took a deep breath before exhaling it shakily. When words finally spilled out of his mouth, they tumbled out so quickly that I didn’t pick up a single word he said.

“What did you say?” I asked, a bit harsher than I had intended, which caused him to bite his lip and look away. I didn’t mean for my words to hold such a cruel tone, but it was the result of my aggravation from not getting straightforward answers from _anyone_ recently. I started tugging on his arms so his attention could return to me. “I actually didn’t hear you, I swear,” I tried again in a gentler voice. “You said it too quickly for me to catch anything.”

The way he was chewing his bottom lip was incredibly painful to look at – his teeth were clamping down on it so fiercely that I believed blood was going to flow out. I impulsively broke out of his grip and reached out to touch it. My thumb ran over the lip, making his teeth release their hold on it. His lips were unbelievably soft, but incredibly red and bruising as well. His teeth had left painful patterns of teeth marks and damaged the skin.

I glanced up to find him already watching me. “Don’t bite your lip like that,” I murmured while my thumb continued to gently glide over the bruised area. “You’re going to hurt yourself.”

He released a humourless laugh, but unlike before it wasn’t laced with malice. “Why does that matter?” he asked tiredly. “I’m already hurting. You hate me.”

I gulped as I considered Phil’s last three words. He must have accused me of hating him at least three times today, yet it was now that my mind finally processed those words fully. Did I hate him? As much as I’d been trying to convince myself that I should be intolerantly angry with him, I couldn’t bring myself to utter that certain phrase to him. He might have comforted me with lies yesterday, he might have not given a single shit that my heart had been crushed. Nevertheless, it didn’t change the fact that he had always been there for me. He had always tried to make me feel better.

And maybe, just maybe, I wasn’t giving him a chance. Although I believed that I shouldn’t _need_ to give him a chance – his betrayal didn’t need firm proof because his reactions as well as hints from others were clearly valid enough evidence – I’ve just been _assuming_ everything. I haven’t really let him talk at all today.

I heaved out a heavy sigh and dropped my hand from his mouth. “Talk to me,” I begrudgingly permitted. I tried to ignore the wary gleam in his eyes as he tried to understand why I was actually letting him explain himself. It was as if he believed I was setting up some sort of trap. “I want to hear what you have to say, Phil. So _talk_ to me, clearly and straightforwardly, before I change my mind.”

“I don’t know if I want to talk anymore with the way that you had reacted a moment ago,” he muttered as he dropped his gaze to the ground again. “I hadn’t realised that it could be such a big deal to you. I’m just hoping that we had been arguing about two different things.”

I frowned at the last part he said, but I chose not to address it. I doubted that we were talking about two different things. “Can you just spit it out?” I asked, straining to reduce the annoyance in my voice. “Please? I’m so tired of hearing confusing and vague answers.”

“I can’t just ‘spit it out,’” he scoffed. “I was nervous to tell you yesterday because I thought you would look at me different. Now I’m _terrified,_ because I feel like you’re going to hate me and leave me.”

I was too impatient at the moment to be sympathetic and encouraging. “I’m going to hate you and leave you right now if you don’t tell me in the next minute,” I threatened.

He furrowed his eyebrows and opened his mouth to say something, probably wanting to shout at me for being so insensitive. I crossed my arms over my chest and raised an eyebrow as if to say “ _I don’t have all day_ ”. He seemed to change his mind on yelling at me, as his mouth snapped shut and his lips pressed into a firm line. I could practically see the gears turning in his head as he tried to figure out how to reveal his problem to me.

Just like before, he took a deep breath. “I’m…” he started softly before clearing his throat to try again with more confidence. “Dan, I’m gay.” He held his breath as he warily watched for my reaction.

I blinked, startled. That wasn’t what I was expecting to hear at all – Hell, it was the _last_ thing I was expecting. I waited for him to expand on those two words, to say something additional, because I felt incredibly unconvinced and unsatisfied that all of that build-up resulted in two words with no explanation.

Phil grew increasingly uncomfortable under my stunned, wide-eyed stare, and fixed his own gaze to the ground for the millionth time today. It was as if the ground was providing him with a sense of protection that I wasn’t offering him with. He started to shift from foot to foot as his cheeks adopted a pink hue. As more time elapsed, the tension and anxiety eventually seemed to make him squeak out, “Is… is that weird to you?”

I tried to force myself to start thinking and stop gawking. Was the concept of Phil being gay weird? It didn’t make me feel uncomfortable per se, but I was incredibly confused and sceptical.

From the time we met until now, Phil has had four girlfriends. Although none of the relationships had lasted for more than three months, he had always seemed content and drawn to each girl. Phil had always strived to provide his utmost time and attention to his girlfriends, and never once had the impression of Phil not having an interest in girls been given off. It was an understatement, to say the least, to say I was confused.

“I don’t understand,” I blurted out, voicing my scepticism before I could even consider my words. “You’ve had girlfriends before. You always seemed to like girls.”

He released an uncomfortable chuckle. “I _do_ like girls,” he explained shyly. “But I’m not… attracted to them. I treated girlfriends like I treat close friends. When I kissed them, it was more of a… friendly gesture on my part. I never felt anything, even though I wanted to. I never felt what… what you felt for Elise.”

I tried to consider his explanation. Phil and I had indeed been arguing about two different things. Here I was accusing him of intentionally stealing my girlfriend, while he told me he wasn’t attracted to girls in the first place. I was straining to wrap my head Phil’s revealed secret, because it was so sudden, so atypical, so _different_ from how I’ve seen him talk to girls that I honestly didn’t believe him.

“I don’t believe you,” the words carelessly slipped from my mind and out of my mouth, causing Phil to recoil. A foolish idea suddenly appeared in my mind and, before I could analyse its absurdity, I started accusing Phil. “I think that’s a shield so I don’t suspect anything. I think you’re claiming that you’re gay so I don’t assume that you’ve been stealing Elise from me.”

Phil’s eyes widened in shock and his jaw dropped in disbelief. “ _What?!”_ he exclaimed loudly in bewilderment. I immediately regretted my careless words when I saw the flash of pure confusion burst across his face. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

I winced when hearing the utter disbelief coating his voice, but I didn’t stand down. “Elise told me that she broke up with me because of _you_ , so right now I don’t believe you when you’re coincidently telling me that you happen to be gay.”

Phil continued to stare at me as if I were the thickest person in the world. The confusion plastered on his face slowly morphed into incredulity and disappointment. “Dan, you’re… such an idiot. How can someone who’s such an amazing student be such an obtuse idiot,” he wondered out loud, the hurt sharp and loud in his words.

I was quite unfamiliar and unacquainted with an angry Phil, so every word he laced with hostility was easily a slap to my face. I staggered back a couple steps, but he grabbed my wrist and pulled me back towards him. “Do you actually think I’m lying to you?” he asked bitterly. Whatever words that I was about to vocalise got caught in my throat, preventing me from making any noise.

My eyes hesitantly travelled up to meet his, and I inhaled a sharp breath when my vision was met with an unfamiliar darkened blue, the beginning of an impending storm. But the storm in his eyes was faltering when our gazes locked. It was as if he was experiencing the same struggle I had been experiencing moments ago, when I had to _force_ myself to stay mad at him. I could tell that he was similarly trying to convince himself that he had to be angry with me, because what I said had obviously crossed a line. Being angry with each other was such an unfamiliar concept that we were both struggling to fully grasp.

“Elise told me she broke up with me because of you,” I repeated quietly, but without strength or confidence this time.

He clenched his jaw while his mind tried to figure out how to address his next words to me. “I didn’t know anything about Elise’s _problem_ until now, Dan,” he eventually bit out, tightening his grip on my wrist while furrowing his eyebrows in frustration. “And I’m sorry that it happened, Dan. But not everything is about _you_.” He took a step forward while directly looking me in the eyes. “So don’t try to twist _my_ words around to make it about _you._ ” His cold stare left me frozen, disabling me from moving and rooting me to the ground as he took another step forward. “I didn’t do _anything_ to influence Elise to make that decision. Under no circumstances would I ever consider being stupid enough to go after someone you’re in a relationship with. Because I respect myself. And I respect _you_.” The iciness in his gaze thawed slightly and he looked away for a moment. “I’d appreciate it if you respected me, too.”

It was a relief to have an absence of the two cerulean orbs, glossy with coldness and disappointment, from acting like daggers piercing into my heart and extracting a tremendous volume of guilt from me. “I do respect you,” I whispered feebly, my voice small and cautious.

His eyes flickered back up to mine while raising an eyebrow in question. “Do you?” he asked, obviously not believing me. “Because I don’t get it. I can’t understand how you can be so _quick_ to genuinely believe that I would actually do that to you.” His firm voice suddenly held a pleading tone. “Why were you so quick to believe that I would hurt you like that, Dan? I thought…” his eyes dropped once more, “I thought you knew me better by now. I thought you would have more trust in me.”

I gulped as I processed his accusations, causing my mind to become too weak to shut out the shame and disgust of my immaturity. The irrational anger that had been shadowing my rational thoughts was now vanishing.

I had felt such a wild need to attack Phil earlier, accusing him thoughtlessly because I was convincing myself that the reason he had been acting so strangely recently _had_ to be linked to me. I hadn’t even considered regarding that his troubles were completely unrelated. I was so desperate to understand why Elise had suddenly left me and how the man she fancied compared to me that those selfish ideas blocked any reasonable thoughts from my mind.

I was so desperate and insecure that I had practically harassed the person who had constantly taken care of me and tried to make me feel better. Phil had always offered me his undivided attention and respect when listening to my problems, and now, when disclosing his own troubles to me, I repaid him by claiming that his dilemma was fake and meaningless.

Shame engulfed me, causing my face to flare up and making me having to restrain the need to slap the stupidity out of me. He was right. I had been so selfish and idiotic to assume that his problems solely revolved around mine, and anything that wasn’t related to me was completely disregarded by me.

I was an asshole.

“I’m sorry.” I understood that saying two words wouldn’t be able to fix anything, that it would only inform him that I was aware that I had fucked up. But I was now desperately trying to cling onto the frail straws of hope, longing for him to easily forgive me. I was hoping he would hear the heavy regret and apology painting my voice and understand that I was truly sorry. But I realised that, although Phil was one of the most kind and forgiving person I knew, even _he_ wouldn’t be so quick to forgive me this time.

He didn’t respond, and I almost believed that he hadn’t heard me. “I’m so sorry, Phil,” I whispered again with more conviction. After a moment of hesitation, I finally gained the courage to start comforting him, my free hand reaching out to the small of his back to bring him closer and making him practically stumble into me. Before he could push me away, my arms wrapped around Phil firmly but loose enough for him to easily escape from my hold.

He inhaled a sharp breath and went rigid in my arms, but he didn’t display any sign to move away, which gave me a small boost of confidence to rest my forehead on his shoulder. “I do trust you,” I insisted softly. “And you’re right, I’m a self-centred idiot. I’ve just been trying to find out why she had left me that it was the only thing I could think about. And I know that’s not an excuse to –”

“You’re right, that isn’t an excuse at all,” he interrupted. I winced at his curtness, but nodded my head in agreement.

“I’m sorry, Phil. I really shouldn’t have –”

I was interrupted once more when he placed his hands on my chest. I was so eager for his forgiveness that I had thought it was a friendly and pardoning gesture. However, my hopefulness was in vain as he started to apply pressure against my chest, and I realised he was trying to push me away. My arms around him immediately fell as he stepped back while maintaining his gaze on the ground.

“I have to go,” he muttered shortly. He paused before correcting himself. “I need some time alone.”

I didn’t want him to go without the guarantee that he had completely forgiven me, but the rational part of my mind was alerting me that my desperate need for reassurance was also selfish. I bit my lip to restrain myself from begging him to stay and allow me to apologise, and reluctantly nodded instead.

I hadn’t realised that his time alone would result in several days of no communication.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guessed it. ;D
> 
> Thank you all for the comments, I appreciate it so much xx
> 
>  **Update (May 19, 2016)** : I know, I _know_ that I haven't updated in over a month because I'm a fucking shit. I keep pushing it back and I know it's super annoying. Trust me, **no one is more annoyed at my indecisiveness and unreliable update schedule than I am**. 
> 
> Truth is, at this moment I'm the happiest I've been in a long time. With that being said, I can't will myself to immerse myself back into writing sadness at the moment. The next chapter isn't happy-go-lucky like I'm feeling, and at the moment I really can't make myself return to negative emotions even though I've been trying for the sake of this fanfic. 
> 
> So this story isn't abandoned, because honestly that would make me cry. I want to say that it will be updated either next week or the first Thursday of June - but I'm an unreliable little shit so don't trust me.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **WAIT WAIT WHAT?!?!?!?! I'M ACTUALLY ALIVE?!?** AND I RETURN WITH A CRAPPY CHAPTER THAT WAS NOT WORTH THE FOUR MONTH HIATUS? (I'll continue my rambling at the bottom of the chapter).
> 
> PS: Thank you [**Alex**](http://maybeelsewhere.tumblr.com/), my beta, for editing this and putting up with me and my procrastination. <3 I couldn't do this without you.
> 
> ALSO, thank you to everyone who has read this story so far, stuck with it, and left so many comments encouraging me to continue the story as well as wishing for my happiness. I love and treasure all of the comments. <3

Phil was ignoring me.

After our argument on Saturday, he hadn't made an effort to communicate with me. I haven't received a single word or message from him all weekend, and now I was staring at the back of his head during our Psychology lesson as he offered his undivided attention to our teacher.

Although he was an obedient student, he never provided such focused attention to our lessons before. At the moment, our teacher was lecturing about the difference between classical and operant conditioning, and normally Phil would not be so absorbed on something so damn tedious. He would turn around in his seat when the teacher wasn't looking and whisper a witty comment that would cause me to bite my lip to hold back snickers.

It was Wednesday, not even five days since our argument. But it seemed as if someone had removed a vital organ from my body. I felt like I wasn't functioning properly. I felt incomplete. I felt empty.

I missed him.

There was nothing in the world that I ever wanted more than to travel back in time to when I had last spoken to Phil and halt my careless accusations from tumbling out of my mouth. I couldn't believe how bloody self-absorbed, careless, and insensitive I had been to throw away my role of being a supportive friend in place of acting like a freshly-dumped madman.

It was heart-breaking enough that my girlfriend had slept with me while having someone else on her mind. It was even more shattering that my ignorant, douchebag behaviour had caused my best friend to avoid my presence in fear of getting hurt more.

After my fight with Phil, Elise had been far from my thoughts as my mind kept conjuring bittersweet memories of me with Phil, similar to how someone would reminiscent about the death of a loved one. Quite frankly, I hoped that comparison wasn't too close to reality, because I refused to believe that my friendship with Phil was dead.

The tiny, rational part of my brain kept reminding me that I was enormously overreacting, and that I shouldn't overdramatise my situation and instead should patiently offer Phil more time and space before he was completely ready and comfortable to talk to me again.

But irrationality always eclipsed the logical parts of my brain.

I had Phil by my side for over two years, and thus was hopelessly unaware of how to act or think in a situation when that sense of inseparability that I had grown so attached and dependent on had suddenly vanished.

I couldn't even pity myself. I knew this was completely my fault.

At the moment, my mind was flooded with the memory of Phil glaring at me, his face saturated with disappointment and frustration as I trapped him in a physically and emotionally helpless position. I squeezed my eyes shut in attempts of battling off that dreadful, almost _haunting_ , image, and instead forced my mind to forget that I had evoked such negativity from the most positive individual the universe had to offer.

In the midst of warding off the negative memory of Phil from the last time we had spoken, my mind finally allowed some of my soppiest moments with him to surface. For instance, we were faced towards each other while lying on my bed, with him mindlessly running his hands through my hair – an act that we quickly discovered was comforting and cathartic to both of us – while I sighed contentedly, fluttered my eyes shut, and relaxed my mind into a soft numbness.

The thought made me smile without thinking. However, the memory was broken by the loud shrill of the bell marking the end of the lesson. I blinked rapidly to return to reality, and slowly realised that, while I had been distracted by revisiting a warm and embarrassingly sentimental moment I had shared with Phil, the said person had already fled the room, leaving his seat empty and me disgruntled.

I heaved out a heavy sigh and slumped down further in my seat, making no move to get up to attend my next lesson. This was a familiar pattern that I was beginning to loathe: Phil escaping before I got a chance to talk to him.

\- x -

It was honestly disgustingly humiliating how dependent I was on Phil.

I was trying to convince myself that it wasn't _dependence_ , but rather I was experiencing worry and anxiety from him giving me the cold shoulder. But I truly didn't know how to react in a situation like this. I couldn't measure how much damage I had done to our friendship, because I wasn't able to compare this situation with any other. We have never truly fought before, especially to the point where we stopped talking to each other.

I absentmindedly fiddled with the grass, too lost in my own thoughts to pay attention to the conversations taking place around me. Honestly, it was quite liberating to not listen to my friends happily chattering away. Whenever they would talk to me, it usually involved asking about how I was dealing with my breakup with Elise. Although I appreciated their concerns, I didn't need to be constantly reminded and bombarded with the breakup. It only helped to swell my already sour mood.

Suddenly, a rough shove at my shoulders forced me to transfer my attention to the setting around me. I whipped my head around to glare at the culprit who had disturbed my thoughts. "What?" I fumed irritably at Chris.

He raised an eyebrow while giving me an unimpressed look. "We've been calling your name for a while now," he replied while gesturing his hand to our friends.

I slowly turned my head to warily observe our surroundings. Everyone was staring at me with concern highlighting their faces. The temperature started to rise in my cheeks and caused me to fidget with my fingers. "Why?" I asked hesitantly.

Before Chris could answer, I interrupted him curtly. "If you're going to ask me about Elise, I'm _fine_."

He rolled his eyes and ran a hand through his hair. "I was going to ask you about Phil, actually."

I immediately tensed up at the mention of Phil's name. Although he was the only person in my mind for the past few days, hearing Phil's name out loud was stressful and somewhat nerve-racking. "What about him?" I asked carefully, attempting to appear casual despite every organ in my body twisting uncomfortably out of sheer apprehension.

"Why aren't you two talking to each other?" Louise asked tenderly. When I responded to her question with silence, she shifted closer to rub my arm comfortingly. "I know your breakup with Elise was hard, but –"

"Are you pissed at Phil because Elise has a massive crush on him?" someone bluntly interrupted, shattering the soothing atmosphere Louise was trying to craft for me.

"Caspar!" Louise scolded with an upset scowl while I winced at Caspar's insensitive directness.

"Mate, shut up," Joe warned, ceasing his conversation with one of his friends to admonish Caspar.

Caspar appeared puzzled by the disapproving reactions his brusqueness had received. "What?" he asked, tilting his head in confusion as if trying to understand our offended feelings from another angle. "I was just going to say that Dan shouldn't be mad at Phil if that were the case. It's not Phil's fault Elise fancies him. He was avoiding her all week, anyway."

"I'm not mad at Phil," I muttered tersely. I made no move to advance this conversation any further. Although I'd been friends with Caspar and Joe since the beginning of the school year, I was in no hurry to disclose something so incredibly personal with them such as the new fragility of my friendship with Phil. Who knew what exposed secrets would be circulating around the entire bloody school if they discovered something noteworthy enough to share without mine or Phil's permission.

Caspar blinked, confusion palpably adorning his face. "Then why –"

"Wait, Caspar, shut up." Chris's voice suddenly became low as urgent words rushed out. "Phil and PJ are coming over."

It took all of my energy to stop myself from biting my nails, chewing my lips, or showing any indications of my obvious nervousness, so I resorted to gnawing the inside of my cheek. Although I strived to not display any visible signs of how I was feeling at the moment, internally my body was an absolute chaotic mess. My stomach twisted into knots, which left no space to stomach my anxiety, thus allowing it to make its way up my throat in the form of bile. I forcefully swallowed it down with difficulty as Phil and PJ sat down directly across from me.

This was the first time Phil had been around me since Saturday on his own accord. Needless to say, I was incredibly nervous to be around him. I had a remarkable talent for fucking things up, and remained fearful that I was somehow going to create even more of a mess from my friendship with Phil.

As he greeted everyone with a weak smile, Phil shrewdly avoided my eyes. When my gaze shifted to PJ, concerned eyes locked with mine. He shrugged his shoulders almost apologetically while tilting his head ever so slightly as if to ask about my wellbeing.

PJ had spoken to me privately on numerous occasions this week, and although he had been reasonably appalled when I told him how I had accused Phil of cheating and then reacted horribly when he came out to me, PJ had been more forgiving of my unwarranted behaviour. He had known me for a decade, thus was quite familiar with every aspect of my mood swings and peculiar or irrational thought processes.

I offered PJ a faint smile, one that barely curved my lips upwards. It probably seemed more like a grimace as it felt stiff around the corners of my lips.

I tuned out the world once more as my gaze returned toPhil. He was shifting on the grass uncomfortably, and his edgy body movements accompanied with the troubled expression on his face helped to give off the impression that he wasn't here by choice. I started to suspect that PJ had forcefully dragged Phil to sit with us – to sit with _me_.

As if noticing my concern for Phil's discomfort, PJ placed a hand on Phil's shoulder and squeezed it reassuringly. He leaned into Phil to whisper something in his ear, and although I wasn't able to hear the words, I could tell that they were words laced with comfort and reassurance as Phil relaxed his shoulders and shifted closer to PJ.

Watching Phil relax caused me to relax as well. It put my mind more at ease when knowing that Phil was comfortable – or at least, as comfortable as he could be at the moment. Normally I made it one of my top priorities to ensure Phil's calm and contented state, but as communication with him had been severed, I was very relieved that PJ was now carrying out that role for me.

I released a small sigh. PJ was such an amazing friend. Sometimes I wondered why he had chosen to stick by me for all these years. Sometimes I wondered why Phil hadn't abandoned our friendship in preference of one with PJ sooner.

All of a sudden, familiar blue eyes flickered to meet my own. It was an understatement to describe my emotions as overwhelmed – as familiar as those eyes were to me, they never failed to startle me with their extremely bright colours. To my relief, Phil's eyes didn't hold the iciness that they had on Saturday, which had generated the impression of them pulling me into a pool of frozen emotions. However, they didn't contain the usual warmth that normally accompanied his warm personality either. At the moment, it seemed as if every shade of blue and green swirled together to form a whirlpool of apprehension.

Phil's gaze left mine sooner than I wanted them to and instead fell on his lap. I almost whimpered at the loss of his eye contact with me – it was the most acknowledgement he had offered me all week. I watched helplessly as Phil rested his head on PJ's shoulder while returning his focus to the conversations happening around us.

I needed to talk to him; to make amends for my terrible behaviour; to apologise profusely for not only hurting him to a terrible degree, but also for making him wary of me and damaging his trust and respect for me. I didn't know how I could honestly win back his respect when I couldn't even respect myself at the moment.

My guilty thoughts came to a halt when PJ exclaimed a comment that provoked laughter from everyone around us. Phil's lips twitched upwards, displaying the beginnings of a smile, and turned his head to hide his face into PJ's shoulder. Although the smile on his face was now unobservable, Phil's frame shook with laughter as he shifted closer to PJ.

The overwhelming influx of negative emotions that entered my mind took me aback with alarm. I shouldn't feel resentful of seeing Phil smile and laugh; I should be _delighted_. Only moments ago I was thinking of how grateful I was for PJ comforting Phil, and now I suddenly felt anything but grateful.

Was I...envious? Uncomfortable? Whatever I was feeling, I knew it was downright stupid. He was my best friend, and although I felt absolutely awful for not being the one to comfort him, help him forget his troubles, make him smile and laugh, I should be supportive enough to acknowledge his happiness, no matter what the source of it was.

But I was an incredibly selfish person. I involuntarily narrowed my eyes as my gaze became fixated on Phil and PJ. Honestly, it felt as if a real-life representation of my friendship with Phil was displayed in front of me, with both people relaxed and happy and close to each other while Phil had his face buried into my – or, in this case, PJ's neck.

I shouldn't feel so hostile about it – I've seen Phil content and happy with other people before. However, other times I didn't have to worry about him replacing me. Also, although PJ – who had been trying all week to convince Phil to give me another chance – wasn't a threatening candidate for a best-friend-replacement at all, I didn't want to watch Phil being so incredibly carefree and at ease with someone else. I didn't want to know how easy it was for him to move on from me.

I bit my lip and resumed my fiddling with the grass in attempts to clear my foolish thoughts.

When the bell rang to prompt students to attend their next lessons, I glanced up to find Phil already missing as everyone else slowly packed up their belongings. I frantically looked around and found him hurriedly heading back towards our school. With a quick goodbye to my friends, I scrambled up and sprinted towards Phil. I wasn't letting him escape this time.

"Phil!" I shouted as I got closer to him. He immediately spun around at the sound of my voice, and his eyes widened as he discovered me running towards him. He appeared as if he was about to turn around and escape into the building, but I caught his wrist just in time to keep him in place.

My grip on his wrist was firm as he attempted to break free from my hold. "Let go, Dan," he hissed in a low voice. I ignored him as he struggled to shake off my grasp, but eventually he grew weary of the unavailing effort and gave up. He didn't meet my eyes when he whispered, "What do you want?"

It was as if someone had suddenly stuffed a batch of cotton wool down my throat, making it dry and disabling me from speaking. Every rehearsed word I had been preparing to say to him vanished, leaving me to stare at him idiotically. My objective had only been to stop him from bolting away from me before he got a chance to acknowledge me, but I didn't know what to do after that objective had been achieved.

"I – uh, well," I stammered senselessly. When I spotted Phil pursing his lips impatiently, I cleared my throat and prayed that my next words were going to be filled with smooth confidence. "I, well, I wanted to talk to you."

His eyes briefly flickered up to mine, allowing me to catch a glimpse of surprise before he diverted his attention to the grass. "I'm going to be late," he muttered, but I knew he was just trying to formulate excuses so he could be free of my presence faster.

"Be late then," I insisted before my voice adopted a pleading tone. "Please, I want to talk to you about what happened last Saturday. I wanted to tell you that I feel so bad –"

I was interrupted by him violently trying to wrench away from my stubborn hold. He released a frustration sigh and raised his head to levelly meet my gaze.

Perhaps he noticed the raw guilt and regret swimming in my wide, begging eyes, because his own eyes softened. He raised his trembling free hand before hesitantly cupping my cheek with it. I froze, not daring to move for fear that any movement would somehow jolt him back into reality with the painful reminder of my awful accusations. Was he going to slap me?

However, as more time elapsed, he indicated no hints of dropping his hand from my face. My grip trapping his other wrist loosened on its own accord, allowing his newly freed hand to cup my other cheek as well. His thumbs were creating soft, circular patterns on my cheek as his eyes were lazily wandering across my face.

I was incredibly startled by what was happening. One minute he seemed as if he wanted nothing to do with me, and the next he was cradling my face as tenderly he could. Nevertheless, I made no move to question him. I hadn't realized how much I had missed the gentle care that existed in his words, his touch, his _everything_ until now.

"When I think about you, I think about everything we've done together. Everything that we have gone through together in the past two and a half years," he murmured with the small traces of a smile lingering on his lips. His eyes fluttered shut as he slowly leaned in to rest his forehead against mine.

My breath hitched as my eyes widened in alarm at the sudden flood of affection he was giving me, although I still remained rooted to the ground and not braving to move a muscle. "I think about how happy you've made me in the time that I've known you. I think about how grateful I am that you offer me a home when I can't find comfort in my own. I think about how grateful I am to have _you_. And more times than not, I think 'Dan is such an amazing guy. I'm so lucky that I've found a friend who I can trust more than anyone else in the world, and have him feel the same way about me. That he trusts me just like I trust him.'"

I watched as his face began to lose its reminiscing warmth as a heart-breaking cloak of betrayal and anger overshadowed any sign of affection. He dropped his hands from my face and took a step back while his eyes, which have now embraced an unfriendly coldness, held mine.

"But then I remember how you spoke to me on Saturday, and any nice thoughts about you vanish." Phil tried to emit an unforgiving impression by hardening his tone, but his voice cracked and he choked on whatever words he was about to utter next. "Then I remember that you don't trust me like I trust you. That you probably don't trust me at all, despite all of the times I've been there for you when you needed me. That you had blindly assumed and believed that I would do something that would hurt you, and then try to cover it up by telling you I was gay. It's as if you don't know me at all, and then I wonder if _I_ actually know _you_. Because I never knew that you had so little faith in me."

He seemed as if he wasn't able to hold my eyes for any longer, so he focused his attention on the ground before us. The following words staggering out of his mouth were cracked, broken, fragile. "I would've been less hurt if you had judged me about being gay. But for you to accuse me of using it as a cover-up so I could go behind your back and betray you? That's... that's the worst feeling in the world, learning that someone you love and care for is capable of even _toying_ with the idea of you hurting them."

When he turned around to walk back to school, my feet didn't follow him despite being extremely late for next period. Instead, my eyes followed him as tears trickled down my cheeks.

\- x -

There was no use wiping the water away from my cheeks, as fresh tears immediately dampened the newly dried areas again.

I had never ended up attending my lessons after my conversation with Phil finished, instead let my legs carry me to the forest. I didn’t quite remember walking away from school, as my mind and vision were hazy with tears. But, here I was, curled up into a ball in the middle of the forest with my head into my knees. Normally Phil would find me in this pathetic state and tried to cheer me up. I knew that wouldn’t be the case this time.

I felt absolutely drained. Not only due to the enormous loss of water after crying for hours. It was as if every passing minute of Phil being angry allowed for some supernatural force to withdraw energy from me, eventually leaving me in a state so depleted of strength and liveliness that I couldn’t even think or function properly.

When the fuck had I surrendered so much of myself to Phil Lester that I couldn’t even behave properly without him? It was not only humiliating, but also absolutely _infuriating_ that I was so dependent on him.

I covered my mouth with my hands as another broken sob escaped my throat. The doleful noise was followed by an aggravated groan, which also encouraged angry tears to mix with the heartbroken sadness soaking my cheeks. Yes, it was infuriating that I was dependent on him; it was even more infuriating that I couldn’t stop fucking crying because of him.

It was quite ironic, really, that he was currently the source of my tears when normally he would be the one doing everything he could to banish them. However, despite the pitiful state he had left me in, I begrudgingly rose to my feet and slowly walked towards his house. It would be a damn _accomplishment_ if I could be more hurt and heartbroken than I already was now.

I didn’t hesitate to ring the doorbell when I arrived before his mansion. I hastily attempted to wipe away the tears from my face once more – I didn’t want to be greeted with pity or concern for my wellbeing, especially knowing that I probably didn’t deserve comfort now.

I didn’t have any plan for what was going to happen when I got the chance to speak to Phil; I only knew I didn’t want him to keep hating me.

The doors eventually swung open to reveal Mr. Alexander’s silhouette. “Hello, Dan!” he welcomed merrily with a warm smile plastered on his face. “Are you here to see Phil? He has been quite down lately, but I’m sure he will brighten up with your help and –” His high spirits dimmed as he furrowed his eyebrows to study me with closer concentration. “Are your eyes red?”

I offered him a weak smile. “It’s allergy season,” I lied. “The pollen has been reacting badly with my eyes.” Before he could smother me with concerns to care for my eyes, I cut him off gently. “May I go up to see Phil?”

With Mr. Alexander’s approval, I ascended up the staircase while anxiously gripping onto the railing. Each step bringing me closer to Phil’s room aided to swell my nervousness.

My hand trembled as my knuckles rapped three knocks on Phil’s bedroom door.

“Come in.”

The knots twisting my stomach tightened, but I strained to ignore the apprehension that was eating me alive as I timidly pushed the door open. Even the simple task of stepping into the room caused my breathing to become rapid and shallow. A tempting beanbag rested at the corner of Phil’s room, and it took all of my energy to divert my attention from it. I was afraid that my quivering legs would fail to keep me standing, and that beanbag seemed like an amazing safe landing at the moment.

Phil’s back was towards me at the moment, but I could still see that he was writing in his notebook. I frowned and tilted my head in confusion before I tentatively murmured, “You haven’t written in that for years.”

His reaction to my voice was predictable, but that didn’t make it any less painful to watch his body flinch and stiffen. I cautiously lingered by his door, probably giving off the impression of wanting to bolt out of the room as quickly as possible, while he slowly turned around to look at me with large, startled eyes.

“What are you doing here?” he asked softly. To my relief, his words didn’t carry a hostile or unwelcoming tone, instead were only filled with sheer curiosity. The fact that he wasn’t immediately trying to shove me out of his room acted as an unspoken approval encouraging me to close the distance between us. I tentatively walked towards him, hoping that my steps weren’t faltering and exposing my nervousness of being in the same room with him.

He watched me warily as I crossed the room, yet he reluctantly shifted to make space for me on the bed. I slowly crawled onto the bed and sat next to him, holding my breath apprehensively as I waited for his face to lose its warmth in place of the cold hostility that had recently occupied his features.

However, his expression didn’t turn cold; instead his eyes studied me guardedly as he waited for me to explain myself. I turned my face away and stared at my hands, watching my fingers clench and unclench into fists and then uselessly weaving together nervously.

“I’ve missed you.”

A huge amount of assorted emotions was crammed into those three small words. I was especially taken aback by the genuine wretchedness that made the words sound broken and fragile. However, when my head snapped up to stare at him incredulously, my gaze was met with huge, startled blue eyes, and I quickly realised to my embarrassment that the three words were uttered by _me_. That _I_ had blurted them out without filtering my emotions to conceal the humiliating sadness that my words were drenched in.

Phil’s lips parted slightly, and I silently watched him opening and closing his mouth before his lips drew together into a firm line. His eyes travelled across my face as if trying to find my true emotions, as if he hadn’t already heard the raw sentiments practically oozing from my words.

His voice was soft and almost inaudible when he finally spoke. However, in a room packed with wary trepidation and awkward pauses, his words acted as if they were hollered.

“Your eyes are red,” he commented in such a hushed tone that it seemed as if he was trying to tell me a secret that he didn’t want anyone else to overhear, even though this room lacked the presence of another individual. He lifted a shaky hand, and for a second I thought he was going to cup my cheek with it. But he withdrew it almost as soon as he raised it, and I tried to extinguish the hope that he had been thinking of comforting me.

I tried to seem casual by shrugging in response to his remark. However, I wasn’t able to casually hold his eyes, which were staring at me with such a shocking amount of worry that I had to break off our eye contact. Looking away from him gave me an extra boost of confidence, and I opened my mouth to apologise to him once more.

However, he cut me off before I could utter a word. “Did… did I cause that?” Phil whispered. My eyes automatically snapped up to meet his again, examining the pained expression on his face. I waited for him to expand on his question, but he seemed to believe as if that vague question was somehow self-explanatory.

“Did you cause what?” I whispered back.

I watched his Adam’s apple bob as he gulped nervously. “Did I make your eyes red? Did I make you cry?”

Although my initial reaction was to comfort him soothingly and tell him that it wasn’t his fault at all, my mouth seemed to have a mind of its own. The hollow laugh and bitter words that tumbled out of my mouth alarmed me, but even my shocked state couldn’t do anything to conceal my sharp and biting tone.

“Not everything is about you, Phil,” I jeered, repeating his words from a few days ago in a mocking tone. “So don’t twist things around to make it be about you.”

His jaw dropped as his eyes grew larger in size, but he was quick to snap his mouth shut again. He looked down at his lap and played with the corners of his notebook paper. “I probably deserved that,” he muttered softly.

I tried to suppress my bitterness as I witnessed guilt flooding his face. What a fucking terrible person I was. He had no need to feel guilty, when I knew everything was _my_ fault.

“Why aren’t you telling me to leave?” I asked warily. “You made it very clear that you didn’t want anything to do with me at lunchtime today. So why aren’t you trying to kick me out?”

My words had the opposite reaction from what I had initially intended. The pain on his face visibly swelled as he winced and bit his lip. “Regardless of what happened, I don’t like seeing you sad,” he murmured weakly.

It was quite a childish comment, really. A childish, naïve, and incredibly foolish comment that I could have almost laughed at the silliness of it. It should have been quite _obvious_ that I’ve been nothing but “sad” for the past week without him.

“So it’s okay when you don’t _see_ me sad? And everything is completely okay if you don’t _see_ how lost I am without you?” He flinched as my mouth continued hurling harsh words at him, but I wasn’t done, even though I wanted to be. “You’re a hypocrite. You’re just as ‘selfish’ as I am.”

There it was, the final strike that had perfectly hit a sensitive nerve. The effects of my words were instantaneous, as his face reverted back to the unemotional expression that I had initially been introduced with when we were fourteen. It was an appearance that I truly despised observing, and in my bitter state I almost believed that he had wiped out emotions from his face to taunt me.

It was extremely inaccurate to say that I felt bad. Honestly, merely ‘feeling bad’ seemed like a juvenile suffering that I now longed for. No, I didn’t feel bad; I felt like I was dying. Every sharp, cold word I threw at him were also daggers in me. It was killing me to watch how I was hurting him once more.

However, for some inane reason, I couldn’t bring myself to apologise at all. I couldn’t bring myself to apologise for my bitter comments, let alone apologise for my careless accusation that had helped build such an awkward barrier between us in the first place. It would probably be more detrimental to stay here since I wasn’t able to say sorry.

I shifted on the bed and got up to leave. However, a cold hand wrapped around my wrist and restrained my movements.

“Stay. Don’t go, _please_.”

I bit my lip but hesitantly sat back down again. I let my fringe fall over my eyes and didn’t turn my head to face him. “Why?”

The uncomfortable hush that fell over the room following my question caused me to shift awkwardly. The silence was extended for such a disturbingly long time that I assumed he didn’t hear my question. Since I believed that my question was going to go unanswered, I flinched in surprise when he actually chose to respond to me.

“I’m sorry.”

Those two words were supposed to be uttered by me. Those two words were the ones I’ve been trying to convey to Phil for the past couple days. Yet here I was, silently sitting on Phil’s bed as I heard those two weighty words slip out from his lips and linger in the air.

I still didn’t turn to face him. “Why are you sorry?” I muttered. “I should be the one apologising.”

Phil released a small sigh and removed his hand from my wrist. The new silence that tailed my words wasn’t filled with discomfort this time. Instead, I figured that he was trying to locate the right words to say.

The bed bounced as Phil moved across the mattress to sit next to me. I watched motionlessly as his fingers tapped anxiously on his thighs. Annoying tapping was what _I_ did whenever I felt bored or anxious, and usually Phil was one of many who mocked me for it. This scene before me was quite backwards: him uttering the apology I was meant to say to him accompanied with him picking up my irritating tapping habits.

“I’m sorry I’ve been so harsh on you, Dan,” he explained softly.

I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion and finally turned my head to look at him. “What do you mean?” I asked. “I deserved it one hundred percent –”

“I agree, you definitely deserved it,” he interrupted. “But that doesn’t mean that I felt good about being harsh on you. So… so I’m sorry. I just wanted some time alone and away from you, but it really didn’t help. I couldn’t feel better knowing that I’ve treated you like crap and ignored you the entire week.”

My eyes widened as I stared at him in utter disbelief. He had every right to ignore me and have some time away from me, and I had every right feeling like shit. “I cannot believe you’re apologising,” I mumbled incredulously.

I watched him take his bottom lip in between his teeth in apprehension. He made no move to produce more comments, instead seemed to wait for what I had to say.

I released a long and shaky breath before fully turning around to face him. My eyes tentatively held his as I murmured, “You don’t have to apologise. _I_ should apologise. And I’m…” My eyes fell to my lap as my voice dropped to a whisper. “I’m sorry, Phil. I really am.”

Phil didn’t respond. Hell, he didn’t make a sound – I couldn’t even hear his soft breaths. He must be holding his breath while waiting for me to continue. I didn’t look up to see his expression, instead mindlessly fiddled with his bedsheets while searching for the right words to say.

“It really was… incredibly stupid of me,” I continued. “Extremely stupid of me. You probably were so nervous to come out to me, and I didn’t even stop to acknowledge how _important_ that was to you. I made it seem like your sexuality was a joke, an _excuse,_ and that’s… that’s an extremely dick move. I don’t know how to make it up to you, and I don’t know how you’re going to forgive me if I can’t even forgive myself for it.”

Phil didn’t respond at first, and his lack of reply only helped to create discomfort between us for the millionth time. But eventually an exhausted breath was heaved, followed by a weight falling on my shoulder. “Dan,” Phil murmured. “Look at me.”

I winced at the request. I didn’t want to look at him at all. I didn’t want him to see the vulnerability plastered on my face, even though he could clearly hear it in my voice. But I also didn’t want to see the effects on him if I started to spew out harsh words again. I didn’t trust my mouth.

Yet I longed for his forgiveness, and I was in no situation to defy his request. I slowly raised my head to meet his eyes, but I couldn’t hold his gaze for long. My stare instead dropped to his nose.

“Dan, you’re an idiot,” he said, but the insult carried a gentle tone. Simply the lack of hostility in his voice was enough to encourage me to look up and hold his gaze this time.

He offered a small smile when my eyes locked with his. However, Phil’s eyes quickly left mine and instead decided to search my face. Phil was surely processing the embarrassing helplessness saturated in my expression; my wide eyes begging for his forgiveness; the rough way my teeth were anxiously clasping my bottom lip.

Phil lifted his hand and touched my mouth, causing my teeth to surrender its tight clamp. As he gently ran his thumb across my bottom lip, he shyly peered at me through his eyelashes.

“Don’t bite your lip like that,” he murmured softly with a nervous smile tugging the corner of his mouth. “You’ll hurt yourself.”

The smile that was threatening to occupy his lips quickly faded as I gave him a confused look. He dropped his hand from my mouth and offered a small sigh.

“Dan, I forgive you,” he finally announced.

As soon as those words tumbled out of his lips, hope began to flood my emotions. Hope must have been palpably evident on my expression, because he released a small chuckle once he saw my face. He rested a hand on my shoulder and gave it a small squeeze.

“I know you’re sorry,” he continued. “And it’s completely useless to stay mad at you. Because you apologised for being insensitive. And you apologised for everything I wanted you to apologise for. And anyone can tell just by looking at you that you regret what you said more than anything. I would have to be a complete sadist if I continued being harsh on you. I’m still mad about what you said, but I know you’re sorry. And that’s all I could ask of you right now.”

I hadn’t realised I was holding my breath until my head became dizzy. I heaved out an enormous breath of relief. “Phil,” I started to say. “I –”

“And now that you apologised for being insensitive,” he cut me off gently. “I want to address something else.”

“Anything!” I shouted enthusiastically, much to my embarrassment as Phil’s eyes widened in alarm at my sudden outburst. However, before I could apologise for it, he nervously giggled.

“I want to talk to you about me coming out,” he carried on. “I know you’re sorry about what you said about my sexuality, but I think you said what you said because of a misunderstanding. I just want to know how comfortable you are with me being gay. It… doesn’t freak you out, does it?”

I realised that after all the commotion around my reaction to Phil coming out to me that I never acknowledged how I truly felt about his sexuality. I placed both my hands on his shoulders and locked eyes with him.

“Phil,” I began gently, hoping my voice was encouraging and supportive. “I’ve known you since we were fourteen, and you’ve been my best friend – the bestest friend anyone could ever ask for. And after all of those times we’ve spent together, you think I’m going to throw it all away and think of you as any different just because you reveal a little more about yourself to me?”

It was his turn to have his face gradually flooded in hope. The nervousness displayed on his expression slowly faded as relief and delight began to surface. It was so nice – no, _beautiful_ – to see his eyes brighten up and sparkle in happiness, his nervous lines on his face disappear, his lips occupied with a smile stretching from ear to ear.

I pulled him towards me and my arms engulfed him in a hug. I felt Phil bury his head into my shoulders – causing his hair to tickle my cheeks in the process – while he quickly reciprocated in returning the hug.

I rested my forehead on top of his head. “Of course I support you,” I murmured into his hair. “It changes nothing, and I am in no way uncomfortable around you. You’re still my best friend.”

Phil raised his head from my shoulder to look at me. And then he offered me a smile that was so sincere and sweet with just the perfect touch of bashfulness that unexpected warmth flooded through me.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **A/N:** I know, I know I said this chapter was supposed to be posted months ago. AND I AM SO SO SORRY. I didn't forget about the story. I was going through a super busy time with school, and after I graduated from high school, I was going through an extremely happy time as I surrounded myself with my best friends and my boyfriend. 
> 
> But when I tried to write this chapter, I found myself unable to fall back into the passion that I had for the story months ago before I went on hiatus. And it took me a while to get back into writing this story again, because when you stop writing something for a while, it's really hard to fall right back into it.
> 
> And that's completely my fault for waiting so long. I tried writing it in June, and I couldn't do it. And after being busy again with university stuff (Oh my god I'm starting university in September, why am I eighteen and why am I going to college, I'm such a child), I finally finished writing the chapter today and decided to impromptu post it without proofreading it for 300 times and without waiting for Thursday and without waiting for my beta to come back from vacation.
> 
> I'm trying to get back into writing. 
> 
> Above all, I AM SO SO SORRY ABOUT THE LONG WAIT. Please forgive me. <3
> 
> PS: This chapter is almost 7,000 words. So that's either a good thing - you're welcome! - or that's terrible - I'm sorry!


	12. UPDATE

UPDATE:

 

As many of you probably have assumed by now, I will not be continuing Anyone But You.  I'm sad to leave this story in the middle of it all, as it's so open-ended now, no closure or anything.  Trust me, I get sad when I find out that a fanfiction or story that I have been loving and hoping for an update never gets finished.

Believe me, I have tried writing this story.  I have tried to continue this.  I long for the enthusiasm that I once had for writing this, because I had so many plans onto where this story would go. I truly do miss writing this story, but above all, I miss possessing the pure love and enthusiasm I initially had for the story.

Perhaps it has to do with the fact that I'm a university student now who is almost 19, and I started to write this when I was 17.  Perhaps it's my own personal experiences in the past year and a half that have dimmed down my passion for writing a D&P fanfiction.  Or perhaps, it has to do with the fact that, although I still watch Dan and Phil and love them as YouTubers and brilliant content creators, as well as love them for their incredible personalities, I can't find myself to convince myself to write a story about them romantically.  Perhaps this has to do with the fact that I do not watch them or keep up with them religiously anymore.  I tried to convince myself that Dan and Phil don't have to be based off of the real D&P, but instead fictional characters made up in my head, but I can't.  

 **Above everything, above all,** I will forever be so grateful that I tried to write, because the fanbase and community that has come around to support me and my writing has been so overwhelmingly caring and beautiful and supportive, that I feel absolutely awful to disappoint you all.  The comments and messages I have received here have all touched my heart and meant so much to me, I cannot express enough how much I loved to make you happy with a chapter, and how much I am sad to discontinue this series and disappoint you all.

I tried to continue writing this story because of you all, so I can make you guys happy, but it's almost as if I don't know how to write anymore.  I can't locate the pure passion that I once retained to help me out with writing this anymore.  I loved this story, I still love it, but I am unable to continue it.

Maybe one day I'll continue it.  I don't know where I can find the time to continue it anymore, but I hate letting things go.  I don't want to let this go, as this once made me so happy.  I would love to say that maybe one day I'll continue it.  But chances are, this is highly unlikely.

I feel like I am making no sense whatsoever.  I feel as if I'm being redundant by repeating the same things over and over again.  But overall, I want you to know that I have tried, and failed, to finish this story due to my lack of motivation and enthusiasm for this particular D&P story.  

I hope you all understand.  If not, just know that I am truly sorry about this.

I'm so sorry,

Raine.


End file.
